Runaway Child
by thingamawhatsit
Summary: Wally is placed in the foster care system at a very young age, eventually finding a home with the Wests. When a fight threatens to place him back in a group home he does the only thing he can think of, the one thing Flashes are know for; he runs. yj-meme
1. Chapter 1

A/N: This story is a work in progress. I've been trying to keep those off this site, but it's stalled and stubbornly refused to get going again. I'm editing it and putting it up here now in the hopes that the editing process will jump start my muse again.

I'd like to take a second to tell everyone about the **Runaway National Switchboard** at http:/ www. 1800runaway. org/ or **1-800-RUNAWAY**. They have 24 hour call services, and are in place to anonymously help teens who are considering or have run away. If that's you or someone you know please call them; they're there to help.

Warnings: child abuse, child neglect, implied sexual abuse, violence

* * *

><p>Your name is Wally Hayes. You are four years old. You live with your mommy at new Uncle Brad's house in Metropolis. Uncle Brad sells adult candy. A lot of people come over to buy Uncle Brad's candy, and your mommy really likes it. You think it must be really good.<p>

One day your mommy eats a lot of candy and gets a tummy ache. She goes to sleep and Uncle Brad gets really mad at her.

She's still sleeping when Uncle Brad takes the two of you on a car ride.

He pushes you and mommy out of the car. Mommy still doesn't wake up.

A lot of people come around. It's scary. You try and hide behind your mommy, but someone picks you up. You yell, and scream, and cry, but they don't let you go.

Someone puts a jacket over your mommy's head.

It's the last you ever see of her.

Your name is Wally (Hayes) Sullivan. You live with Mr. and Mrs. Sullivan, and five other foster children. The grownups say your mommy is gone. That she isn't ever coming back. At first you think they're lying. Mommy came back for you (when she forgot you) when you got lost at the park. Mommy will come back and get you now.

Shannon is one of the older girls that live with the Sullivan's. She's really smart. One day you ask her what foster means. She says it's what they call kids that no one wants.

Mommy doesn't come and get you. You start wetting your bed. You stop talking.

Your name is Wally (Sullivan) Bailey.

Your name is Wally (Bailey) Cooper.

You wish they had all been liars.

Your name is Wally (Cooper) Sanchez.

You start talking again. You start yelling. Screaming. Crying. Flailing.

You stop getting food. Sometimes dinner, sometimes breakfast, sometimes lunch.

When you do get food one of the older boys always tries to take it. It's _your_ food.

Your name is Wally (Sanchez) Murphy. The Murphy's live in New Jersey where people talk funny.

You're six years old. You start going to school. They put you with kids your age so you're in first grade.

It's confusing. All the other kids seem to know more than you do.

It's horrible. The other kids are mean. They all know each other, and you're new and different. They tease you about your hair, and your freckles, and when they learn about it they tease you about the free lunches you get at school (you've started taking some of it home with you, in case you stop getting dinner again).

It's wonderful. Your teacher's name is Ms. Green. She says you're special. Sometimes during recess you stay inside and she shows you things you couldn't understand during class. She teaches you how to read and write, how to add and subtract and she teaches you about science. She says science is her favorite subject. You decide it's your favorite subject too.

When school ends you have to say goodbye to Ms. Green. She promises that even when you're in second grade you can still come and visit her during recess.

Your name is Wally (Murphy) Crawford. You live in Gotham.

You've heard about Gotham before. In other places kids tell stories about Gotham to scare each other. In Gotham kids tell the stories so they know what to do. They tell you how to hold your breath when people scream or laugh a certain way. They tell you which places smell like fish all the time, and which don't. They tell you what grass you really don't want to walk on, which flowers you don't want to pick. They tell you to be nice to cats, and give them bits of food when you can, because the cats remember and sometimes they'll help you back. They tell you about Batman, and how he tries to save everyone even though he can't.

You've heard about people like Mr. Crawford too. Mr. Crawford likes belts, and closets that have locks on them. He doesn't like it when kids do something wrong. Mr. Crawford is _strict_; someone is always doing something wrong.

Jake is the oldest foster kid. At first you're afraid of him. He's bigger, and stronger, and it wouldn't take much for him to hurt you; but Jake is good. He finds food when you aren't given any, and makes sure everyone has some. Sometimes when Mr. Crawford is really mad he makes sure it's at him.

Jake says the foster part doesn't matter. He says you're siblings, and siblings watch out for each other. For you, in Gotham, in the Crawford house, Jake is Batman. He isn't always there, and he can't always save you, but he tries anyway.

You get second place in the science fair. Jake forges Mr. Crawford's signature, and sneaks you out so you can go. He tells you one day science will get you out of the system.

Mr. Crawford finds out.

Your name is Wally (Crawford) Freeman (you think it's ironic, you don't feel very free).

You have to change school in the middle of the year. They're learning different things here, but science is still your favorite subject, and science is still your way out. You spend your recess in the library looking at all the science books.

Your name is Wally (Freeman) Webb. You are eight years old.

They decide that there's something wrong with you.

They try and give you pills to fix it, but you can't swallow them and when you do they make you feel funny, like someone else is walking in your body. It makes you mad. Everything always gets taken away from you. You don't want them to take this too.

It makes you so mad that one day you take your body back, and bite Ms. Webb's hand when she tries to put the pill in your mouth.

Your name is (Wally Webb) Wallace. You live in a group home with twenty five other boys.

Your first night there some of the other boys sneak into your room and beat you until you're black and blue.

They keep on giving you pills. You don't like them any more than you did the last ones but if you don't take these they tie you up to the bed and leave you there without food or water.

You stay there for seven months.

Your name is (Wallace) Wally Rivera. You live in Central City, home of The Flash.

It isn't long before The Flash is your favorite superhero. He's _awesome_. He fights bad guys and saves the day and he still has time for _everybody_, even for kids like you. Heck, even for his _villains_. Plus, on top of all of that, The Flash likes _science_. He says he uses it to help him catch the bad guys.

Whenever things go bad, which is a lot, you escape with science. You learn more and more about it. In your head you pretend you're using it to help The Flash with the latest supervillain or alien invasion.

Your name is Wally (Rivera) Davis. You are ten years old.

You're bigger than you used to be. Stronger. Quicker. Not by much, but by enough. When one of the other boys attacks you, tries to take away your food, _he's_ the one who ends up hurt. You're angry, and you're riding the thrill of having bested someone.

You don't stop hitting the other boy until you're pulled off.

Your name is Wally (Davis) Jackson. You're eleven. The oldest foster kid in the house.

Mr. Jackson scares you. You don't know why, but you know something about him is wrong. You do your best to keep the others safe; little Emily and Josephina. You teach them about being siblings like Jake taught you, and most of all you stress not to make Mr. Jackson angry.

The day you find out what's wrong with Mr. Jackson is a blur. You remember walking in on him with Emily, and Emily crying. You remember your mind going silent and your body tingling. You remember making Mr. Jackson mad, making him hit you, making him ignore Emily. You don't remember the hits you took. You don't remember where the scissors came from, but you remember the feel of them going into Mr. Jackson's leg. You remember thinking that the blood coating your hand was warmer than you expected.

You grab Emily and you run outside.

The police take you down to the station. You're put in a room with a mirror that they can see through and you wait; the light harsh and glaring in your face. A blonde man comes in wearing a white lab coat. He takes your clothes, and takes pictures of the bruises blossoming on your skin before he gives you new ones. He scrapes underneath your finger nails, and takes a molding of your teeth (you didn't even know you had bitten him, you hope it gets infected.) The whole time he talks to you in calming, matter of fact way. He tells you everything he's doing, and why he's doing it, and when you ask him questions, about chemicals and procedures, he smiles at you and starts explaining the science behind his actions as well. He tells you to call him Barry instead of Mr. Allen. He thinks you did a very brave thing.

Your case worker disagrees. She says this shows you have a "violent personality."

You spend a week in juvenile detention.

When they let you out, a long time before you ever thought they would, Mr. Allen, Barry, is there with two other adults.

"Wally," he says, "this is my brother and sister in law Rudolph and Mary West. They're going to be your new foster parents."

Your name is -

Wally Hayes

Wally Sullivan

Wally Bailey

Wally Cooper

Wally Sanchez

Wally Murphy

Wally Crawford

Wally Freeman

Wally Webb

Wallace

Wally Rivera

Wally Davis

Wally Jackson

_Wally West_


	2. Chapter 2

Hope is a hard thing to kill. It rises from despair again and again when it should be crushed. It shines through even when it is told to leave, that it has no place. Wally goes into the West household firmly stomping down on the sparks of hope that try and kindle inside him. The more things change the more things stay the same, and he knows that different does not mean better.

They show him around the house, and tell him all of the rules. They talk about his school, and when he'll be going back.

That night he lays in a bed they say is his, in the room that they say is his, under sheets and blankets that they say are his now too. But things that are yours are things that you get to keep, and Wally doesn't expect to keep anything.

He doesn't sleep. He waits and when the house is quiet but for the shifting and sighing of the frame, and he walks on sock covered feet down to the kitchen. He grabs a few items, little things, and carries them back to the room with him. Slowly, and with as little noise as possible, he hides the food, careful to remember where each item is put.

He takes out a sock nestled among his few clothes and carefully upturns it into his hand. He checks on them under the light of the moon as it filters through the blinds. These are things that are his. Things that he's managed to keep from one place to another. They are small, useless things. Buttons and oddly shaped rocks almost small enough to be labeled as pebbles. A rubber ball, and a bottle cap with a faded star. A necklace with a broken rusted chain.

Wally runs them through his hand carefully before placing them back in the sock one by one. He crawls underneath the bed and tucks the sock in between two of the supporting planks of wood.

He spends the rest of the night in a fitful kind of sleep, interrupted by nightmares that are half memories and half endless unknowns filled with dread.

* * *

><p>"Wally, we've told you before, no sneaking food before dinner is ready,"<p>

Wally is pale, thin, and small in a way that is all about angled bones lying just beneath a stretch of skin. His eyes have a slightly wild edge to them, always prepared to follow the quickest of motions.

He puts the bread down under Mr. West's gaze. "Yes sir."

Mr. West frowns, and Wally's eyes latch onto the kitchen tile.

"Come on, since you're in the kitchen you might as well help. Over here." He walks over to the place Mr. West has pointed to just in front of the stove. Never once does Wally make eye contact or turn so that his back is to Mr. West. He hands Wally a large plastic spoon with slots in the middle. "Your job is going to be to stir the noodles. You have to make sure you stir them pretty often, almost constantly, so that they don't stick together. You got it?"

There is a movement that might be a slender shoulder shrugging, and Wally begins to stir his pot carefully. Mr. West stands next to him keeping his body language as open as possible as he tends to the sauce. He stirs in the vegetables that he has already cut, and soon the timer for the pasta goes off. Mr. West fights off the urge to outright grin as he turns back to Wally. Wally's voice is caught between hesitant and small, and loud and curious, like it's the ball at the end of the string on a paddle board. "The noodles are done?"

"Maybe," explains Mr. West, "The timer means that it's time to check on it." He takes the spoon from Wally, and uses it to pull out a single noodle, the water dripping out into the plot below. He holds it until the steam no longer billows off of the noodle, and then angles it towards Wally. "Here."

Wally finally meets his eyes, heavy with suspicion. "I thought I wasn't allowed to eat any of it before dinner?"

Mr. West feels a smirk start to crawl onto his face. "Tonight you're a cook, and a good cook always tastes the food as he goes. That way they know if they need to add anything, or if they need to cook things longer."

Carefully Wally leans forward and eats the noodle off of the spoon.

"How is it?"

"Good? I think it's done?"

"Perfect. I'll drain the pasta and then we can check on the sauce. Mary always tells me I never use enough sage, and I could use a second opinion."

Wally smiles, and for the first time Mr. West can see the playful little boy underneath all the tension and worry.

* * *

><p>When they find the food Wally has been taking he's certain that it will be the moment when things go wrong. They'll figure out that he's not worth it and they'll either treat him the way everybody else has treated him or send him away and away and away, always away to somewhere different.<p>

Instead of any of those things though they sit him down to talk. He keeps on waiting for one of them to call the case worker or to tell him to fetch a belt from the closet but they don't. Instead they give him his own cupboard in the kitchen where he can keep food just for him. Food that he's allowed to eat whenever he wants or needs. Food that won't be taken away as a punishment.

They even start sending him to school with small containers of food so that he always has access to some.

It's more than he ever expected. More than he knows what to do with. More good than he honestly knows how to handle.

So he doesn't.

* * *

><p>A few weeks later he just kind of - snaps.<p>

Mary asks him how his day went, and he just starts yelling. Screaming. He uses every curse word that he knows, and a few words that he didn't realize could be just as bad when used correctly. He takes the vase on the kitchen table, and he throws it on the floor, watches it shatter into a million different sparkling edges amidst a puddle of water, and scattered flowers trying to maintain the look of life.

Rudy picks him up and caries him into the living room. Wally keeps screaming, and thrashing until finally his energy wanes, and he's just leaning against Rudy's larger solid frame (he doesn't realize until later that his feet have been bare and that he's stepped on shards of glass, adding small streams of blood to the collage on the floor).

He waits for them to throw him out, for them to see how useless he is, for them to realize that they don't want him any more than anyone else.

They don't.

His punishment - extra chores, no TV, no internet - last for three weeks. The second week Mary is helping him with his history homework, and he accidentally calls her mom. Tears threaten to leak out of her eyes. "Sweet talk all you want mister, you're still grounded for another week."

Wally feels his face heat up when she leans down to hug him, but he doesn't really mind.

* * *

><p>One day Wally figures out that his Uncle Barry is The Flash.<p>

If Wally was a different kid, if Wally was a normal kid, he would be amazed and excited.

Wally is terrified.

It's a secret. It's a _big_secret, and Wally isn't supposed to know it.

He _isn't supposed to know._

So with the same kind of determination that got him through years and years of bad situations he puts it from his mind until it's almost like he doesn't.

* * *

><p>Things are good. For a long time things are good, until Wally passes the point of pushing away hope, and Wally <em>wants<em>the what he has, until he excepts that it isn't going away.

He has a room and a bed, sheets and a dresser, clothes, and toys, and books, and _love_.

So when his parents start fighting, not just a little bit, but a lot, every night (or at least every night they speak to each other), Wally panics. He panics and he does the first thing that he can think of to make sure that they can never _ever_ get rid of him.


	3. Chapter 3

His actions have consequences. More than just the searing pain of chemical burns. More than the volts of electricity ricocheting inside his body. They mean that Uncle Barry tells Wally's parents his secret identity, and that Wally has to tell everyone how he figured it out. They mean late night talks between all of them that Wally can hear, but not make out, echoing up through the vents into his bedroom. they mean new lines across his dad's face, and bags under his mom's eyes from loss of sleep and smeared mascara.

They mean that sometimes the world moves slow, and speed thrums through his veins, bright and fast like a smile.

They mean Wally has to undergo more medical tests than he has in his entire life.

He's in a quiet little corner of the waiting room at Star Labs with his Aunt Iris, waiting for one such test involving the exposure to a class four chemical, when she decides that it's as good a time as any to start a talk.

"You know, it's kind of funny that this all happened when your parents where getting into a lot of fights, don't you think?"

Wally shrugs, and fiddles with the drawstring on his Flash hoody where it is bunched up in his lap.

She sighs and looks him over, taking in the hunched shoulders and bowed head. "Did you know," she says, "that I was adopted? I was found in an alley, and for the longest time my mom told us that the stork left me there because we didn't have a cabbage patch, and he got confused." Wally sneaks a few glances at her out of the corner of his eye, a bead of curiosity planting itself in his mind. Wally knows her and her reporting well enough to know she never tells a story without a point. "I was a little bit older than you when I started acting out over it. I was convinced that since we didn't share the same blood there was no way that my they could love me as much as they loved each other. I started going out to these parties, and going out with all these older boys, and then when my parents got mad at me it was just proof that they didn't love me as much as they did Rudy or Charlie. I started all sorts of fights with them."

"Well I come home one day from a date, and Rudy is waiting for me in my room, and he just gives me the biggest hug ever. Tells me that he loves me, I'm his favorite sister and that if anyone hurt me they were gonna have to face him and he'd knock 'em 'round good."

"He liked you better than Aunt Charlie?" Wally looks a little surprised that he has spoken, caught up in Irsis's story.

"Better than Aunt Charlie."

Wally bites at the inside of his lip. "Did you stop fighting with your parents after that?"

"Gods, no. We still got in fights all the time. But it was easier after that, to believe that they could love me just as much. And, eventually, we did get things sorted out; even though it was hard."

She wraps her arm around Wally and pulls him against her side. "I know it's difficult sometimes with the family we have out here. The five of us - me, you, Barry, Rudy, Mary - we don't have any blood to help hold us together, so fighting can be pretty scary. But we love each other, and that's the most important part of family. We fight, and we work things out, and we _love_ each other."

Wally's arms snake around to hug her, and she can feel him nod where his head tucks against her side.. She runs a hand through his hair and leans her head down to plant a kiss on his scalp. "So if you get scared again you come to me, and I'll give you a great giant hug, and we'll figure everything out together, alright kiddo?"

He tightens his grip around her for a moment in agreement. She continues to run her hand through his hair, and in a few minutes he falls asleep with his arms still pressed against her side.

* * *

><p>Only half awake Wally acts on instinct, and takes cover under a nearby table before he can process what woke him. The Receptionist's desk is scattered about the waiting room in pieces, the girl who had been working there cowering on the ground with blood running from a gash on her head. In front of her is a man with a flowing white shirt that opens in the front, revealing his chest and a ring of gold necklaces. He has long black hair and a goatee. A wand is in his hand pointed straight at the trembling woman.<p>

Wally's breath comes out in a whisper, "Abra Kadabra."

Aunt Iris is sitting in her chair, and Wally can just see her hand making a sharp shooing gesture in his direction, but…

Wally has stood by and watched stronger people attack weaker people before. He's been that weaker person too many times before. Too many times to just stand on the side lines or run away now that he has the power to help.

Besides, Aunt Iris is family; even if he didn't stand a chance he couldn't just leave her there.

Still superspeed is pretty useless when he's hiding under a table. Wally crawls to the far end of his hiding place, and checks to make sure that Kadabra is still distracted before he makes a dash into one of the hallways. There's an open supply closet just around the bend, and he opens it up to see what he can find. For a disguise he grabs a pair of safety goggles, and puts on the Flash hoody still clutched in one hand. He grabs a bottle and stuffs it into his front pocket and he makes his way back into the waiting room at a run.

In the time Wally was gone, a man made his way out from the labs behind where the Receptionist's desk used to be. Kadabra is turning towards him, wand pulled back and ready to strike, when Wally slams into him, grabbing onto his upper arm and letting his speed wrench Kadabra around at an awkward angle. He follows Wally for a few steps, dragged along by his own arm, before Wally loses his grip. Wally stutters to a stop at the far end of the room and turns to face Kadabra.

Kadabra is holding his shoulder, teeth clenched, and hand white around his wand. All of his attention is on Wally now, which was kinda the point; attention on him means he's not attacking someone else. It sets his teeth on edge, but it's totally according to plan, whatever that plan may be when he actually gets around to making it.

Wally puts on his widest smile, and bounces on the balls of his feet. "Are you still even pretending to do magic? I mean, attacking Star Labs? If magic actually existed instead of everyone being fakes like you wouldn't you be robbing like, an occult store or something?"

"You dare question the great and powerful Abra Kadabra!" Kadabra yells as he swings his wand. A bolt of energy races out at Wally.

It loses. Wally runs just out of range down yet another hall, and hopes that Kadabra is like any playground bully he's dealt with in the past. "Ha," he sings, "missed me, missed me, now you gotta kiss me!"

Kadabra lets out a growl, and follows Wally down the hall wand waving in an attempt to hit him. "Insolent fool. I will crush you, and get what I have come for. You will not stop me boy."

Wally zips away farther and farther down the hall. "Hey, did you ever try getting a moonstone? You know, turn into Alakazam so you might actually be able to do something?"

Wally reaches the end of the hall, and ducks into a large empty lab at the end. At least empty of people; there are a few little glowy things scattered around the mostly open space that Wally assumes are probably not good things to hold a fight around. But no people and decent space isn't a combination Wally expects to find somewhere else nearby. Plus he is having a harder time getting out of the way of the energy blasts while stuck in the hallway; the lab would have to do.

Kadabra steps into the room, and Wally makes a run for him. His punches, when they land, seem to meet against some other force just above Kadabra's body letting off a white sheen. Kadabra barely even flinches, and uses the opportunity to hit Wally with one of his energy blasts, throwing him across the room.

"Ow." Limbs aching Wally rolls away and pulls himself into a standing position.

"Still finding this funny, boy?"

"Your _face_ is funny." He runs at Kadabra again, this time testing the field with light taps. The glow is emitted not only where he is hitting Kadabra, but from the large gold belt buckle engraved with an A. Wally falls to the floor when Kadabra raise his wand again, and rolls to the side of the room to avoid another energy blast. He's turned to face Kadabra again in time to see the same glow once more. Kadabra's wand is stretched out towards something behind Wally, and he hears ripping sounds behind him. A large machine encased in a glow rips itself off the wall, and it flies through the air at Wally. It's too big for Wally to doge to the side again, and so he runs at it, sliding along the floor underneath it.

Wally gets to his feet, and palms the bottle, still in his pocket He grins over the ruined machinery at Kadabra. "You know the nasty thing about using technology? All it takes to short it out," Wally runs at Kadabra once again unscrewing the lid on the bottle and throwing it at Kadabra's belt buckle, "is a little bit of liquid." Liquid drips into the cracks of the buckle and at Wally's next hit the white sheen disappears with a crack, and smoke drifts up from the buckle.

Wally stands there over Kadabra as he gasps for breath, and realizes that at this point he had absolutely no idea what to do next.

Luckily, it isn't too long before the Flash comes running into the building, wrapping Wally in his arms, and taking care of the police that arrive right behind him.

* * *

><p>There was a time when Wally couldn't help anyone, not even himself. Now, with his superspeed, Wally can help people. Not just a few people either; Wally could help hundreds, maybe thousands of people. He wants to be that kind of a person, the one who runs toward a call for help instead of ignoring it or running away.<p>

For two days he's grounded, and restricted to his room when he's not at school while his parents talk with Aunt Iris and Uncle Barry. On the third day, Uncle Barry comes up to talk with him.

"I know you want to help people, Wally, and we're very proud of you for that, but you also need to be very careful with your powers," says Barry. "When you hit Abra Kadabra with your speed you broke one of his ribs, very nearly punctured one of his lungs and it could have been a lot worse than that. With your speed, you're capable of dealing a blow that could stop a man's heart. Do you understand?"

Wally hadn't thought just hitting someone could be so dangerous and his skin chills at the thought. "Yes Uncle Barry."

"Good, come on, I have something downstairs I want you to see." Wally follows Barry down the stairs and into the front room where a small box is placed on the table in front of Aunt Iris and his parents.

His dad says, "Well. Open it up."

Wally opens the box and stares, mind numb, at the contents. It is a superhero costume. A superhero costume in his size. He looks up at everyone, eyes wide with disbelief. "Really? I get to be a real hero?" he asks.

"There's going to be a lot of training so that it's safe for other people, _and_ safe for you. And you have to promise us all you'll be careful."

"This is," Wally searches for a word that could describe it, and promptly gives up, "this is so cool!"

"You like the suit? I had little compartments put on the arms so you could always have some food on you, like a portable version of your cupboard."

"It's awesome!"

His mom gathers Wally into a hug, and soon the whole family joins.

"Just be careful," his mom whispers.

On this day Wally West becomes Kid Flash. It is the first time in Wally's life that he gets a new name without losing an old one.


	4. Chapter 4

The whole thing feels like some sort of crazy fairy tale. He keeps on thinking he died during the experiment, or when he was fighting Abra Kadabra, and none of it is real, but he can't think of anything he might have done to deserve something so amazing, so incredible, as what his life is now.

But life isn't fair, and that's how he knows it's real; he just never thought it could work in his favor.

A big part of Wally's initial training, of Kid Flash's training, is following Uncle Barry around all day, running across the country and back, and meeting all of his friends. Uncle Barry, _The Flash_, is a really friendly person, and since pretty much anywhere in the world is just a run away he has _lots_ of friends. Really, really, _really_ awesome friends.

They meet up with the Green Lanterns, _both of them_, in a large empty grove outside of some city (geography is another part of his training because, apparently, calling San Francisco "that place with the bridge" might not be the best idea if he ever needs to call for help). Excitement is thrumming through his entire body as Uncle Barry introduces him.

Wally wants to make the best first impression that he can so he uses his very best manners. "It's very nice to meet you Mr. and Mr. Green Lantern."

He doesn't quite get why Uncle Barry starts coughing, and talking about how they have matching rings, (of course they have the same rings, that's what makes them Green Lanterns) but the first Green Lantern starts looking kind of funny, and Wally starts to think he's done something wrong on his very first meeting with other superheroes. The other Lantern rubs at the bridge of his nose for a second, and sighs, before looking Wally straight in the eye (his costume started out with lenses like The Flash, but they kept on making his eyes itch on the way over, even if Uncle Barry says there's no reason for them to, and he had rubbed at them until they popped out. And poked his eyes. He really hopes Uncle Barry doesn't make him wear them again. They're evil). "Green Lantern is a title, Kid." He looks him over once, head to toe, and sighs again. "My name is John Stewart."

"This is so cool," Wally says, the words slipping out without a conscious thought. Wally feels his entire body heat up, centering on his face, and he knows even with half his face covered his blush is easy to see. The Green Lantern's, John Stewart's, lip curls up slightly.

"Hey now," says the first Lantern, "no fair, stealing the Kid's attention before I get a chance. _My name_ is Hal Jordon, but if you want," Hal gives a sideways glance at John, a smirk of his own working its way onto his face, "you can go ahead and call me Uncle Hal."

The rest of the day is spent training with the Green Lanterns, learning how to stop bad guys, and how to save civilians, by practicing with green constructs of people projected out of the rings. He's already really good at dodging, and knows how to take a hit, and 'Uncle' Hal and 'Uncle' John both praise him for it.

In the end Wally is tired, and happy, and something that he thinks might be content. Uncle Barry talks to the others for a moment before heading home with Wally, and when they turn back Wally is sleeping on the ground curled up against the side of a tree.

"He's a real good Kid." says Hal.

Barry leans down, and gently picks Wally up from his spot on the ground, rearranging him so that he fits more comfortably in his grasp. "He really is."

* * *

><p>He already knows Jay Garrick and his wife Joan, but he never knew about Jay being the original Flash. It makes his " back in my day" stories a lot more interesting.<p>

* * *

><p>He meets Batman when they go to Gotham to pick up Wally's new goggles (after the fifth set of lenses Uncle Barry agrees that they aren't working out, so they compromise with the goggles instead). But Wally barely even notices Batman. Batman is mysterious and intimidating, but he's also practically a shadow, and shadows are pretty standard fair in Gotham.<p>

Robin is a different story.

Robin is light in every definition of the word. He moves like nothing, not even gravity, can hold him down. And on the odd occasion where Gotham doesn't provide a shadow for Batman, Robin, with his bright colors and eye catching movements is the light that casts the shadows in which he moves.

For most of Wally's life the world has been polarized into us and them, family and other, all or nothing, with no room for friends to find a place somewhere in between. It's easy to be Robin's friend though, he's younger, but not someone Wally needs to provide for, a better fighter, but not someone he has to be wary of. Wally enjoys himself when he's hanging out with Robin in a way he can't remember ever having done before.

Wally loves having someone that's just a friend, and if Robin is a light then Wally becomes a moth, coming back to Gotham again and again to see him.

* * *

><p>The first time he meets Speedy and Green Arrow he and The Flash follow a criminal into Star City. Speedy is the straight man to Green Arrow's "plucky" humor ("Get it Kid? Because of the bow, and the string, and, oh never mind). Watching the two of them bicker is a little bit like watching a sitcom.<p>

Afterwards, when the villain is caught, Wally gets to meet Ollie and Roy when they all head over to Ollie's house for something to eat. Hanging out with Roy, and being his friend is a little bit like being friends with Robin, and a little bit like having an older brother again, and not quite like either of them, all once.

At home, everyone is happy that Wally has started making friends, and Wally is the happiest of all.

* * *

><p>Well, he <em>tries<em> to come back to Gotham all the time. Batman doesn't like other heroes in his city, even if he doesn't seem to mind Wally hanging out with Robin, and that makes it hard for Wally to talk his way into hanging out.

So sometimes he sneaks into Gotham so they can hang out behind Batman's back.

It's one such day, and Robin is in the bathroom when Wally hears the screams start. Not just any screams, _the_ screams, the ones that Wally learned about years before in whispered stories on the playground.

Quick changes are nothing to laugh at when you're a Flash. Wally is in his costume almost immediately. He holds his breath and starts grabbing people, running anyone who hasn't been affected away from the growing mist of fear gas into (relatively) clean air farther down the street. He takes gasping breaths with each person delivered to safety, and goes back for as many people as he can.

Soon enough he sees Robin and then Batman heading to the epicenter to confront Scarecrow, each wearing his own gas mask. Wally contents himself with playing crowd control, and occasionally running in to grab a terrified victim that wanders close enough for him to grab in a single breath. When everything is done Wally follows them onto a nearby rooftop, doing his best to prepare himself for Batman's wrath.

Wally waits in silence for whatever punishment Batman decides to give. He's waited for punishments in silence before, once for the better part of the day, and while the minutes that Batman has him wait stretch on longer than the minutes did in the past because of his speed he knows better than to offer any sort of excuse.

Eventually Batman breaks the silence. "Next time," he growls, "call the cave before you come to Gotham, understand?"

Wally feels a grin stretch across his face, and bites back the urge to hug Batman. "Yes, sir! Wait, no. No, sir. The Batcave has a telephone number?"

Batman reaches into one of his utility belt compartments and brings out a business card that he hands to Wally. There is nothing on it but a single number. Wally stares at it, speechless, and when he looks up Batman is gone.

* * *

><p>Batman stops complaining about Wally being in Gotham. Once or twice he even lets Wally come out on patrol with them.<p>

* * *

><p>Middle school was a bearable necessity, and occasionally Wally would learn something that would make it seem worth while on its own merit instead of as a means to an end.<p>

When Wally starts going to high school everything changes. Central City High has three main feeder schools that go into it. One is the middle school Wally had just left, and one is the middle school Wally had gone to when he lived with Mr. Jackson.

Hunter Zolomon is a kid that went to Wally's first middle school, and he hates Wally. At the old school, desperate to get cough medicine for Josephine, Wally had stolen Hunter's lunch money from his backpack in the boys' locker room. Angry at Wally, and unable to prove his claim, Hunter had done his best to make school miserable for Wally. When they end up in English together Wally finds that time has done nothing to diminish Hunter's grudge.

High school is hell, and the only thing that makes it bearable is being Kid Flash when he leaves.

* * *

><p>Robin tells him his secret identity, and Wally is tempted, for the briefest of moments, to tell Dick about the times when he was Wally Hayes, and Wally Crawford, and Wally Davis; but Wally's the metahuman, and Roy and Dick are both normal. He can't stand the idea of being the freak with this too, the only one not to get adopted, the only one that had to stay in the system.<p>

* * *

><p>Wally loves it when Aqualad first shows up, not really for Aqualad as a person, but because it means he's no longer the (sidekick) partner with the least experience. Roy is the one who hangs out with Kaldur the most, since he's the one who lives on the west coast, and Wally is the one who manages to hang out with the new guy the least, mostly because Uncle Barry still doesn't trust him around large bodies of water (he really hadn't meant to slow down while they were running over that lake, and he's sure he would of figured out how to do a doggie stroke before too long, so it really shouldn't be that big of a deal).<p>

It's not really until _The Day_ that Wally gets to spend that much time with him. He's pretty much as awesome as Roy said he was, which is good, because they need all the awesome they can get when they end up in Cadmus.

* * *

><p>At the end of the night when morning starts to come and Superboy sees the sun for the first time Wally calls his parents to see if they are okay with housing another foster child for the weekend. They say okay and as far as Wally is concerned that means he's coming home with him. It takes a little bit longer to convince some other members of the league that it's the best idea, but Uncle Barry knows why it is, and<em> Batman<em> knows why it is, so everything works out.

Wally teaches Superboy a lot while he is fostered at his house during his first weekend away from Cadmus. He teaches him how to tie his shoes, how to hug, how to floss, and how to make (and eat) the best sandwich in the world. It's actually kind of nice to be a big brother again for a bit.

They are at the mall, and Wally is teaching Superboy about the awesomeness that is after battle ice cream, when the Superboy asks Wally to tell him the one thing he _really_ wants to know. "Why doesn't he want me?"

It has nothing to do with what they were talking about before but there is no question in Wally's mind who Superboy is talking about. He knows that Dick, and even Batman, think it's just a matter of waiting for Superman to come around, but Wally knows it might not be that simple. He looks around trying to figure out how to explain everything to Superboy in a way he can understand with real life experience whose days can still be counted on one hand. His eyes catch on a store window.

"There's this thing," says Wally, "marketers use it when they try and sell stuff, called demographics. They target a certain group - a sex, a nationality, an age group - that kind of thing, and those are the people that are supposed to buy their products. Like that over there." Wally points to a shiny display window with a variety of remote control cars. "Those are supposed to be for kids, usually little boys. But not everybody in the target demographic is gonna buy it, right? Some little boys just don't want to play with remote controlled cars."

Slightly frustrated with Wally's apparently random conversation change Superboy nods none the the less, though his hand is clenched suspiciously tight.

"Well, sometimes, the little things in life, like remote control cars, can be like the big things in life. Even though there may be an adult who is supposed to do something for a kid they may not be able to, or they might just not be interested. But do you see that lady there? The one who's checking out her new remote control car before she even gets home. She's totally not in the target demographic for one of those, but she went and bought it anyway."

Superboy feels his breath start to come out funny as he processes what Wally, said and tries to apply it to himself.

"I don't know if Superman is ever going to come around in regards to you, even if he basically is your own little target demographic. He might never want anything to do with you. But just because he doesn't want a remote control car doesn't mean it's a bad remote control car, or that no one else is going to want it."

Superboy contemplates everything for a moment. "I'm the remote control car?"

"That's pretty much the metaphor, yeah. You know what metaphors are, right?"

Superboy nods, "A figure of speech in which a term or phrase is applied to something to which it is not literally applicable in order to suggest a resemblance, or something used, or regarded as being used, to represent something else. They're more complicated than the Genomorphs made them seem."

Wally laughed. "They can be. Just remember, dude, this weekend makes us foster brothers, so whatever else happens you still have me."

* * *

><p>Batman and the League okay a team for the four of them turned five of them. Wally has more friends than he has ever had before and almost all of them gather in one place. Life is good.<p>

School starts and they bring in some girl to replace Roy all in the same day. Whatever anger he has about what happens during the first he puts towards the second. Roy is not replaceable. None of them are supposed to be replaceable.

He calms down, a little bit, about Artemis as time goes by, but unfortunately school becomes an ever worsening hell pit. Hunter, who had already turned most of Wally's grade against him, makes it onto the football team, and starts to get the other kids in on it to. There isn't a day that goes by where Wally isn't bumped into in the hallway, called a name, or in some other way harassed. The school has a policy of punishing all participants in a fight, even if someone only participates in the form of a human punching bag, and Wally doesn't want to try and explain to his case worker that it really isn't his fault for getting suspended, so the times when he gets caught in a corner he just rolls along silently with the punches.

It's Monday after a bad weekend, and Wally wants to be anywhere besides school. Dick's arm got broken on the last mission, and the Rogues killed a man who thought Keystone would be a good place to become a serial rapist, which brings up a whole box of conflicting emotions. Sometime Wally thinks it would be easier to work with villains that never crossed the line into gray territory, to only have to deal in the world in whites and blacks, rights and wrongs.

He's sitting in the cafeteria trying to come to some sort of internal conclusion about the whole thing, and fighting away the irrational gilt over Dick's arm, and these things distract him from his surroundings so that he doesn't notice Hunter and a group of his friends approaching until its too late to get up and avoid them.

Hunter is at the front of the group, and knocks Wally forward so that his chest bumps into the table. The others form a semicircle behind him, effectively blocking Wally in.

"Go away." Wally says, a token effort to make them leave him alone.

Hunter's smile is cruel and absolutely genuine. "Come on now _Jackson_, that's no way to treat your friends."

Wally's teeth grit together, and for a moment he can feel the phantom presence of scissors in his grasp.

"Leave me alone, Hunter."

"Come on now, we're just being friendly." He punches Wally's arm in a way that's supposed to hurt and look friendly all at the same time. Wally barely even registers it. Conner's friendly hits really do hurt, and Hunter has absolutely nothing on Conner. The students gathered around Hunter laugh at Wally's imagined pain anyways. For a second Wally uses the thought of Conner, of his friend actually having a name, to pull his temper back down. "I know," continues Hunter, "why don't we share our lunches. I think you have enough there to share with everybody, don't you?"

Wally's hand intercepts Hunter's on the way to his lunch without a thought, instincts based in survival stronger than Wally's attempt at staying calm. "Don't touch my food." His voice comes out in a low growl usually reserved for villains that have harmed his uncle or his friends, and for a second Hunter looks taken aback, his own instincts recognizing the danger in Wally's voice.

The second of hesitation is made up for with interest. In the tight space Wally looses almost all of the advantage he would have gained from his speed, and Hunter uses his larger body to pin Wally against the side of the table, free hand moving out to sweep all of Wally's food off of the table, splattering it onto the floor. All while hidden from any teachers who may interfere by the wall of his friends.

Wally jerks his head upwards and smashes into Hunter's nose with a crack. Hunter stumbles back, hands going to his face, and releases Wally from his hold. Wally has just enough time to stand up facing the crowd before the first of Hunter's friends starts to retaliate.


	5. Chapter 5

A moment can be many things. It can be a second. It can be something that is shared by two people. It can be a period in time that bridges the gap from one sequence of events to the next. For Wally, the moment after his fight stretches out until the end of the week.

* * *

><p>Wally receives a score of bruises that blossom over has skin like he's been splattered with finger paint. The dislocated shoulder, he will admit, is mostly his own fault, as he pulled it out on purpose to surprise the other boy into releasing his hold.<p>

There are seven other boys, including Hunter, arranged in various chairs throughout the office. A few bruises can be seen here and there, but the most obvious damage is Hunter, whose nose is slightly crooked, and a boy a year above Wally named Matt, who had the unfortunate luck of being the landing pad for another boy that Wally had flipped over when deflecting a punch.

Wally sits in silence as the others clamor for attention, and twist the story this way and that in their retelling. His mind is completely blank, his body an object far removed, and every part of him knows nothing more than what it means to wait.

Uncle Barry comes to pick him up, and under his guidance Wally tells his own story, falling automatically into the cadence of a debriefing.

Uncle Barry speaks to people, and signs the paperwork about Wally's suspension.

Wally waits.

They head home. Uncle Barry makes both of them eat something. Wally eats what's given to him with a ruthless efficiency.

Uncle Barry makes some phone calls. Wally goes upstairs to his bedroom, and waits.

One by one the rest of his family arrives home. The house is filled with the noise of waiting. Waiting, and whispers of conversations that lead nowhere.

His mom comes up to his room and knocks on the door. He gives her permission to enter while still on auto pilot. As the door opens a beam of light enters the room and it occurs to him that it has gotten dark out.

She sits on his bed, and for a while they wait together.

* * *

><p>Tuesday the waiting stops. Tuesday he knows how he's going to be punished.<p>

* * *

><p>For a while he had forgotten.<p>

Nothing is a certainty.

Nothing is forever.

He never gets to stay.

* * *

><p>Wednesday is a day of bartering with a woman who won't change her mind. Wally would compare it to running into a brick wall, but he's had more success doing that in the past than what they manage.<p>

* * *

><p>Wednesday turns to Thursday, and before the blanket of the night can lift, terrors creep their way along the floor and into Wally's dreams. Shadows, and doubts that flay at his mind, and do nothing to strangle his screams.<p>

* * *

><p>"Why can't you just change it, just go in over her head, or have Batman fix everything? Why can't you just," Wally breaks off with a sob against Barry's chest, tears soaking into his shirt.<p>

Barry rubs along Wally's back as soothingly as he can. "It's complicated, Kid. We're doing everything we can, I promise."

One of Wally's hands twist into a fist around the fabric of Barry's shirt. "You're a superhero." He whispers. " Why can't you just keep me safe?"

* * *

><p>Wally dreams of a place where the only control to be had is over others. He dreams of a place with small, closed in rooms. A place where food is a privilege that has to be earned, and no one is worthy. He dreams of a place that takes away his names, takes away his face, takes away who he is.<p>

* * *

><p>Friday Wally makes sure he times everything just right. His dad's home from the night shift, and has just fallen asleep, and everyone else is at work. He leaves a note in his dresser draw, on top of his clothes, and pockets the sock that has resided under his bed for the last four years.<p>

He gets to Happy Harbor after Conner and M'gann have left for school, but just in case he takes the time to get into Mount Justice through the beach side entrance. He goes to his room and grabs two bags, one which he fills with clothes, more durable than his ones at home as they are made to withstand battle if necessary, and the other he brings to the kitchen and fills with food, eating as he goes.

When he's done he stands in the door way for a moment, taking in the cave one more time, and in the blink of an eye, he's gone.

* * *

><p><em>Dear Mom and Dad,<em>

_ I love you. I never expected to, but I love you both so much. You have been the best parents I could have asked for, and you've put up with more from me than I thought anyone would ever put up with. No matter what, I'm always going to think of myself as Wally West and I'm always going to think of you as my parents._

_I can't go back though. I love you all, and I want to stay, I don't want to leave. But I can't go back to a group home, no matter what I'm not going back. So if I have to leave, I'm going to do it on my terms._

_Whatever kid you end up with after me is going to be really lucky. And maybe when I'm 18, if it's okay with you guys, maybe I can come back and visit?_

_Tell Uncle Barry that I'm sorry I blamed him, because I really don't. I know he always did his best for me. I know all of you always did your best for me. And if you could have Uncle Barry tell my friends I'm sorry for not going on missions anymore. Should've had more self control, just like BC is always saying._

_Pretty much just tell everyone I said I love them._

_Tell them I said goodbye._


	6. Chapter 6

The great thing about being on salary is that as long as he gets all his work done no one complains about Barry taking off early, or stepping out for long breaks to deal with some crisis or another. And he does have to deal with crises more often than your average Joe. But of all the ways he can get called away from work, an alert about a Rogue, a call on his communicator from the League, Barry always finds a regular telephone call to be the most worrying. A million calls about someone trying to end the world are less stressful than just one about a loved one that's been hurt, or is in danger.

Barry picks up the phone in his lab, and presses the little red button to pick up the line on hold. "Hello?"

"Wally's gone." Rudolph's voice is brittle as he relays the news. "I woke up, and when I looked for him he wasn't here. He's not out as Kid Flash, nothing is missing, but," he stops, and for a while all Barry hears is his ragged breathing, as though his brother in law has to stop and catch his breath to continue on. "Barry, he left a note."

"I'm leaving right now."

Most of the time being the fastest man alive means that Barry is quick enough. Means getting wherever he needs to go in time to save the day.

But sometimes it doesn't.

* * *

><p>Kaldur always looks forward to Fridays. Even this week, knowing ahead of time that no mission will be given while Robin still recovers from his broken arm, Kaldur cannot help anticipating practice and training with his team.<p>

Everyone else has school, and so Kaldur arrives at the mountain to find it empty. He pulls out several snacks from the kitchen for his friends to consume upon their arrival, and sits down with the book he has been reading at Robin's suggestion, Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, beginning to read where he last left off. (Aside from the random act of violence perpetrated against a whale, he is rather enjoying the story, and finds that the dolphins are in character.)

It is some time later when Kaldur hears the first of his friends beginning to arrive. He marks his place in the book, and prepares for the usual rush that accompanies Wally's entrance, and subsequent search for food. His brow furrows slightly when instead he is greeted by Conner and M'gann. A glance at the clock shows that they have not been let out early.

Conner begins to tell him about a creative writing assignment they were given during English, an infectious smile on his face, and he pushes his worry to the side. It is possible that Wally had something after school that needed his attention.

Robin, Artemis, and Black Canary arrive in close succession a few minutes later, and Canary gathers them in the training room.

"Wait," says M'gann, "shouldn't we wait for Wally to get here?"

"He was in a fight at school earlier this week." Black Canary informs them. "He won't be joining us this weekend."

The news is…surprising. Although Wally could at times act childishly, and did have something of a temper, Kaldur has never seen him resort to violence for either reason. It holds troubling implications for Kaldur. Either something happened at Wally's school to change the behavior he normally exhibits, or for some reason Wally felt that violence was necessary, even knowing that such actions would most likely lead to just such an absence from the team. A glance with Robin shows that the news concerns him as well. Whatever has happened at Wally's school Kaldur knows they will get to the bottom of it.

As soon as they finish training with Black Canary.

* * *

><p>Training doesn't take as long as it usually does, and not because of Robin's cast and Wally's absence. It is interrupted by a gust of wind that solidifies into the Flash. Or at least almost solidifies. He's shaking in place to point of blurring, but just in focus enough for Robin to see that his cowl is on wrong, one side caught behind his ear letting out a tuff of blond hair.<p>

His words do little to calm the uneasiness that takes hold of Robin's stomach at the hurried appearance. (When does the Flash ever appear hurried? Robin has seen him look calm and at ease with less than five minutes left in a countdown to earth destruction. The Flash just doesn't _do_ rushed.) "Have any of you seen Wally today?"

Kaldur answers for them all. "N-" The Flash disappears, running through the mountain. "-o."

"Wait!" M'gann flies forward, hand outreached as though to bring him back and hold him in place. "What's wrong with Wally?" Her hand fallss slowly, and she turns back to look at the rest of them with wide eyes.

Robin activats his wrist computer and, slower than usual with the added interference from his cast, pulls up the signal from the Flash's communicator. "It looks like he stopped in Wally's room. Come on."

The Flash is sitting on Wally's bed when they arrive, back bent over and broken like an old man. The contents of the room are scrambled - closet door thrown open, dresser draws pulled completely out and tossed aside, books in various heaps on the floor. The only piece of clothing in the entire room is the uniform that Wally uses for missions. It's in stealth mode as the Flash runs it through his hands, the deep red of the lightning bolt slashing through the black fabric like a wound.

Conner speaks, his fists clenching tightly at his side, his whole body coiled as though prepared to take a blow. "What's going on with Wally?" His voice is low and almost threatening, until it breaks on the last word.

The Flash doesn't respond. He doesn't seem to even notice the presence of six other people in the room with him.

Black Canary steps forward, and grips Conner's shoulder tight enough for him to feel it press into his muscles. "Flash. Flash!" she says, and still he doesn't respond. "Barry! You need to tell us what happened."

The Flash looks up at the sound of his name, and Robin is certain that his face wouldn't look any different in this moment if he could see his eyes instead of blank, empty lenses. "He's gone."

Robin's mind is whirling, trying to put everything together so that they can work on fixing things, saving Wally from whatever has happened in the last week. "How?" he asks. "Did someone take him? Is he under some kind of mind control? You need to tell us what happened. We need more information."

"It's not that. He just…left. He ran away."

Robin can feel himself starting to get mad. "Wally wouldn't run away. So stop, stop whatever this is, and help us figure out what's going on!"

The Flash just shakes his head, running a hand up through his hair dislodging his cowl. His eyes are blood shot, tear streaks pooled awkwardly in an outline of his mask. "He left a note, saying goodbye."

"If he did run away," asks Artemis, "than what exactly is he running away _from?_"

Barry tells them.

And Robin, Robin doesn't know what they're supposed to do. Because everything he thought he knew about his best friend is wrong. Robin can feel his hands shaking, emotion bubbling up in his chest, squeezing his lungs tight against his rib cage. Because nothing is as wrong as Wally's absence.

What Robin does know is that this is Barry's fault. Barry, and Wally's parents. "None of this would have happened if you would have just adopted him!"

"We wanted to. We really did. But after he got his powers it was a lot riskier. They do an inspection before an adoption is processed, and we had a few close calls with someone finding out about Wally's powers before, on visits that were a lot less thorough than the inspection would be. If the wrong people figured out Wally was a metahuman and knew that he's a ward of the state." Barry cuts himself off, apparently unable to finish the thought. He takes a big, shaky breath. "So far no one has tried to take Conner back, but if they do, if they attack here at the base, everyone here would be able to put up a fight." He locks eyes with Conner. "It's part of the reason we decided to place you here instead of having someone take you home with them. It would be safer for you, and safer for the people you're living with. If someone decide to take Wally from his house he might be able to defend himself, but his parents could be used as leverage. We thought - we thought it would be safer."

"We can't do anything about the past." Black Canary says. "What we need to do is find Wally so that we can work this out. Robin, look at the security tapes, find out when Wally left the mountain. Kaldur, see if there are any League members available to help us. The rest of you, come with me."


	7. Chapter 7

It's hard to believe that there is anything that the full power of the Justice League can't do, but the news spreads like rot from one person to the next, through the Justice League and beyond into the greater superhero community, and the news that is brought back is always the same.

Nothing.

Nothing.

Nothing.

_Nothing._

It's a bitter consolation that the older heroes knew as much as they did before Wally left (with the exception of Batman, but then Batman is always the exception). It's a twisted sort of knowledge that one of them, at the least, can evade some of the most powerful people in the world. They aren't being treated as children, as the lesser end of a partnership; they are on equal footing with the other heroes in the search for Wally, and it's one of the worst feelings in the world.

All they really are is equally useless.

* * *

><p>Artemis doesn't know Wally that well. She <em>knows<em> him (knew him?), but she's only been around for a little while, and their whole friendship's sort of shaky and antagonistic. She knows him, but she doesn't really _know him_, you know? So she hadn't really been surprised when she found out she didn't know about all the crap he went through, after it's not like she talks to anyone about her family dramas.

The thing is that even though she's not the one that knows Wally the best, not by a long shot, she's the one that _gets it_. She understands how he could leave everything behind to get away from something that she, that _he_, just couldn't do. She understands the need to gain some sort of control over life when every option seems as though it will be as bad as the last. Hell, to a certain extent she's been there, back when her parents were having "custody issues," and her mom was still learning how to function in her wheel chair. The difference is she was never on the streets as long as Wally has been already, and she always had a place to run to.

She doesn't know Wally very well, and she understands better than the others. It's a hallow kind of comfort, but she wraps it around herself like a shield.

* * *

><p>In Central City a missing persons report is filed. With the note confirming that he's a runaway the police do little more than process the paperwork.<p>

* * *

><p>In the middle of the chaos that ensues from Wally's departure Kaldur finds that it is easy enough to locate a corner, and quietly access a computer terminal. Though he is no Robin it is still only moments before he has the information he desires.<p>

The next day finds Kaldur in Central City making a series of discreet stops.

He is not pleased with what he learns. At all. Although the fight is the only altercation reported it is by far not the only one. Instead he finds it last in a long list of systematic abuse. It is _possible_ that his displeasure is apparent, but all the promises of changed behavior in the world mean little after the damage has been done, will mean even less without Wally's return.

His team is a responsibility that Kaldur takes very seriously, and if he perhaps makes a show of meeting M'gann, Conner, and Artemis at their schools occasionally in the upcoming weeks he feels he cannot be blamed. He will not fail them in such a way again.

* * *

><p>Roy can feel the bags that have gathered underneath his eyes. He's had little sleep lately, less than usual even. He's in a city, and it doesn't matter what city it is, because the places he's searching have all begun to look the same to him. The people have all begun to look the same to him.<p>

He's starting to worry that he won't be able to pick Wally out even if he does come across him.

"Roy." He didn't hear Ollie join him on the roof, but to be honest he's still used to Ollie's presence, still falls into sink with the older man whenever they are together without a conscious thought. He doesn't notice Ollie joining him because he's still so used to him always being there. "Roy, you need to get some sleep. This isn't helping anything."

He has the urge to snap at Ollie, to tell him that he _can_ take care of himself. To remind him that he's not a child. But…

He remembers when Wally first found out that he was adopted. He remembers telling Wally all about his father and Brave Bow, and he remembers Wally's response. He didn't respond with the usual condolences, or look at Roy any differently than he had before. He just told Roy that he was lucky, and that Wally was glad that Ollie had adopted him. At the time Roy had put it off as just another instance of Wally being socially awkward, or thinking it cool that he got adopted by a rich superhero.

But ever since he found out that Wally was a foster kid (found out that Wally was gone) he can't help looking at those words differently. Because Wally wasn't as lucky as he was. Wally didn't get adopted; Wally didn't always have someone that was there for him.

Ollie puts his hand on Roy's shoulder and turns him away from the roof edge so that they are facing each other. "We'll find him. Just come home for a while, get some rest."

He's too tired to do any good right now, and underneath his stubbornness he knows it. He lets out a breath and nods stiffly. Ollie's hand trails off of his shoulder and Roy gives in to the emotions tumbling around inside him, and leans forward to wrap his own arms around Ollie. If anyone calls him on it later he can claim exhaustion. "I'm glad that, that you…"

Ollie returns the hug, arms wrapping tight around him. "I know. Me too."

* * *

><p>The steady beat of his heart is loud in Dick's head. The smell of chalk dust blooms with every impact and shift of his hands on the equipment. He's cut away at portions of his cast so that to free his movement, and it's only years of practice in every imaginable condition that let him compensate for the injury, placing the smallest amount of stress on it possible. His muscles are lost somewhere in the constant movement of his limbs, a prevalent ache that tells him that the only thing that keeps them moving is his continued momentum.<p>

It takes a moment, lost in the rhythm of movement, to notice Alfred waiting patiently off to the side. He finishes a few turns and dismounts onto shaky legs. He grabs his towel, wiping off excess sweat, and takes large gulps from his water bottle.

Alfred doesn't say anything in a way that itches at the back of Dick's mind, inviting him to fill the empty air with his troubles. For a while he stubbornly refuses, not even making eye contact with the older gentleman as he studiously concentrates on the wall.

Alfred has years of experience at getting stubborn young men to talk though, and eventually Dick snaps, throwing his water bottle and whirling around to face him. "Why didn't he _tell me_? Why didn't _Bruce_ tell me?"

Alfred made a soft humming sound in the back of his thought. "And what, precisely, would that have changed, Master Richard?"

Dick threw his arms wide. "It would have changed this!"

Alfred stays quiet for a moment, letting the room fill with the sound of Dick's panting breath. "I see. So if you had known Master Wally was a foster child earlier you would not have been troubled that he ran away."

"Yes! No!" His voice drops to a whisper, "No. It's just, didn't he trust me?"

Alfred approached and, ignoring both propriety and the sweat that still clings to him, gathers Dick into a hug. "I highly doubt that it had anything to do with you, Master Richard; some things are not a matter of trust."

Face pressed tightly against Alfred's chest, in a position that he has whispered so many of his secrets and fears, Dick tells one more. "I'm scared. I'm scared I won't ever get to see him again."

Alfred runs his hand through Dick's hair, holding him tight. "I believe a great many are scared of the same thing."

* * *

><p>Mount Justice becomes the central hub in the search for Wally, and people find themselves gravitating towards it whenever they have a free moment, as though their added presence alone will somehow help. It's the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, and there are more people crowded into the mountain than there have been since the first day that Wally ran away. It will be the first holiday since, and it is made all the harder by the knowledge that it is Wally's favorite; all about food, and family.<p>

It is also the day that Batman activates a new search program aimed at detecting Wally's movements. Since the first day when the team had watched the Flash break down in Wally's room he has been making a noticeable effort to act normal, and he hovers over Batman's shoulder as he implements the program with an air of casualness that is faked so well it's almost believable.

"So, how exactly is this supposed to track him?" Ollie asks. The heroes within earshot stop to listen to the answer.

Batman seems to consider before he answers. "It analyzes data to find anomalies that appear or disappear quickly, and flags incidents that show signs of a participant engaging in abnormal speeds."

Flash frowns. "I thought we were already looking for any signs of him helping people."

Batman's hands pause over the keyboard for one telling second. "The search parameters have been expanded upon."

The Flash's teeth grind together tightly. "Wally is a good kid."

Batman stays silent. Ollie coughs nervously and tries to stretch a smile across his face, attempting to find anything that he can say to diffuse the situation.

The Flashes hands ball up into fists. "He's a good kid."

* * *

><p>Mary West drags herself out of bed sometime before another day begins. Sometime after the last one ended. Sometime. It doesn't really matter. The last times she ate, showered or left her house are fuzzy ideas in the back of her head. She thinks she might have done something on Thursday, but today has been Thursday, and Friday, and Wednesday several times before she gave up on labeling it. It's all the same.<p>

Wally is still gone.

By the time Rudolph gets home from the double shift he had picked up, that he had needed to pick up since she stopped going to work, the alcohol in the house is gone too.

* * *

><p>Eventually the team is given a mission.<p>

Wally's absence is a constant ache, like the phantom pains of a missing limb, but it isn't the first time they have fought wounded, and it won't be the last. The mission is a success.

* * *

><p>Christmas approaches and M'gann can barely contain her excitement. She learned all about Christmas from Earth television.<p>

Christmas is magical.

She decorates the mountain with pine branches, bows, bells, tinsel, blinking lights, mistletoe, and a tree. She watches all her favorite Christmas specials on the TV. She gets presents for Uncle J'onn and all her friends. She starts making piles and piles of cookies so that there will plenty for when he comes (and she doesn't care what the others say, he's coming and she knows it). Christmas eve she sets out a small batch, a glass of milk, and goes to bed early even though she spends most of the night lying awake, too excited to sleep.

She wakes up in the morning and they open presents. All of them are very nice, but they can't compare to the one she knows is coming. She spends the rest of the day in the kitchen making every dish she's ever learned.

The few hours of sunlight pass, darkness ticks by, and suddenly Kaldur is in the kitchen with her, hand stopping the motion of her rolling pin over the pasta dough.

"M'gann, perhaps it is time to retire for the night?"

She shakes her head and shakes Kaldur's hand off from her own. "He's going to be hungry when he gets here," she says.

"M'gann…"

She ignores him and focuses on her pasta dough. Last time she made it too thick, and her raviolis didn't turn out right. This time everything has to be perfect.

Kaldur sits patiently off to the side, and speaks to Conner in a soft voice when he appears before Conner joins him in his silent vigil.

Midnight comes and Wally hasn't returned. There is no Christmas miracle.

Conner and Kaldur are there to hold her when she cries.

* * *

><p>People begin to notice that Kid Flash stopped appearing. The press is easy enough to persuade that nothing has happened when they notice Kid Flash's absence. But the press is always happy to eat up every word the League says. The Rogues aren't so easy to fool. They've faced The Flasher often enough to know when something is up, and the Kid missing is definitely something. Something enough to be the topic of Thursday Night Poker.<p>

"Could be he's just out of the game," suggests Heatwave. "I fold."

"So Baby Flash steps down and the Geezer comes out of retirement? Don't make no sense." Mirror Master shuffles his cards in his hand making aborted glances the various mirrors that they had covered before the start of a game. He throws two red chips into the pile. "I raise."

"Raise." Boomer throws in five red chips without glancing at his cards. "Well, he ain't dead. Bloody Flasher just about flipped his lid when I suggested it. Still got the damn bruises."

Piper seems to study his cards, consciously not humming any song, which is a shame because Cold has never met a tell quite as expressive as Piper and his humming. "You don't think someone has him, do you?" Trust Piper to go all bleeding heart on them. "Call."

"All in!" The Trickster pushed forward an overflowing pile of candy.

"You went all in last hand," Cold reminds him. "You're out."

The Trickster pulls his candy back in with a huff. "See if I share with you."

"I say who cares if he is? Not like the Kid is our problem." Weather Wizard say. "Fold."

Cold grunts in agreement, throws in his five chips, and nods over at Mirror Master who grudgingly throws in another two. "Last thing we need is some other League reject thinking they can move in on our turf, or the Flash takin' a dive off the deep end.," says Mirror Master. "And the way he ruffed up Boomer ain't exactly a ringin' endorsement on his state o' mind." The others grunt (or in Piper's case nod) in agreement. Mirror Master turns over his cards revealing a flush. "Not exactly good for business either."

Boomer frowns, throwing his three of a kind off to the side in disgust. "Are we actually talking about wanting that annoying little pipsqueak back?"

"I like him," says the Trickster, carefully arranging all of his candy into a house. "_He_ gets my jokes."

"Like I said, annoying."

Piper turns over four Jacks. Cold and Weather Wizard both groan at the display, and Piper takes that as his cue to take the winnings. "We should do _something_. We can't just let something happen to him."

"Of course not," Weather Wizard says sarcastically, "we just _make_ something happen to him."

Piper glares and Cold can feel a headache building behind his eyes. "We're not doing anything, because we don't know anything. Keep your ears to the ground, not _literally_." Trickster gets up from the floor, and back into his chair where he balances it precariously on two legs. Cold sighs, and reminds himself that he is nobodies' mother. "We'll figure out what to do, if _anything_, when we know more. Now hurry up and deal the next hand."

* * *

><p>Wally's birthday is January 16th. Every superhero, and all of the Rogues, have heard the date often enough that there is no way they could forget it.<p>

The day passes in conspicuous silence.


	8. Chapter 8

Selina sets out for her heist just as the sun begins to fade along the horizon. Chicago isn't quite like Gotham city, the shadows less willing to swallow a person, and she makes use of the purple, twilight hues to mask her movements through the less familiar streets. She circles around the old apartment building where her source told her the small cat statue she's after is held on its way to a wealthy black market buyer. It has obvious signs of abandonment, broken windows in front of plywood boards, weeds breaking through the cement like a small forest, and dangerously corroding bricks that lend credence to sign condemning the building.

On the fourth floor small rays of light peak through the cracks between the window frame and the plywood.

Really, Selina knows the economy is bad, but that's no excuse to have such sub par security, at this rate she won't even break a sweat. She flips across the alleyway off of the fire escape of the neighboring building, and grabs hold of a window ledge three spots over from her target, feet shuffling lightly against the mortar as she falls into a vertical crouch against the buildings exterior. Whatever took out the glass also got rid of a good portion of the plywood here, the reason she aimed for this window in particular, and she pulls herself through the hole one limb at a time.

She can't quite believe her luck. There, in the middle of what would have once been a bedroom, are several distinctive looking crates. The tops come off with a little bit of effort and she clears the packing out of the way, discarding a few other priceless items before she finds the right one.

The light in the room changes and the door creaks open. She puts the statue into a satchel at her hip.

"Hey!" She turns to face the doorway, and more specifically the large goon doing a better job at blocking it then the door had been previously.

She cocks her hips. "Well, what are you waiting for, big boy, come and get me."

Predictably, he charges.

She leaps forward, planting her hands on his shoulders, and flipping over him. She lands on the ground in a crouch, and sweeps one legs backwards sending him flying into the stack of half opened crates. He lands hard, the crash heavy enough that she feels it in her legs, the floor creaking ominously, and loud enough to grab the attention of the two other men that are guarding the haul.

She makes a dash for the window, the men rush into the room, and the creak of the floor turns into a large groan before it splinters apart sending all four of them falling to the level below.

Right onto a group of sleeping squatters.

Someone screams.

There's motion. It's hard to see exactly what's going on, the best light source coming from the room above and to the side, and it filters down like rays through a storm cloud, driving the shadows deeper in contrast.

A weight hits her heavily around the middle, and for a few moments she lets the rest of the world fade to the background as she focuses on getting out from under the heavier man.

A twist and a push send the man flying into the darkness, and the surprised yell tells her that someone unwittingly broke his fall. She get back onto her feet, sweeping the room with a quick glance for any sign of an escape route, and suddenly there's a glint of metal reflecting in the corner of her eye. There are too many bodies in the room for her to maneuver out of the way quickly. She makes a futile reach for the whip at her side, and just as her hand wraps around the handle the air is filled with a sharp _CRACK_.

The gun spirals along the floor, the man who had been holding it seconds before stumbling to the ground clutching at his obviously broken arm. One of the squatters is standing behind him wearing a hoody that, along with the lighting, obscures their features so that all she can make out is the general size and shape of a teenage boy.

One of the squatters finally manages to get the door open, it having been blocked by the fallen debris until that moment. Streetlight falls in from a hole in the wall, bathing the whole room in a sepia tint. The squatters began to rush the door.

Behind the boy the other two incompetents from the floor above seem to gather some of their wits. They move to rush in tandem, and Selina cracks her whip off of her belt and through the air, passing inches from the boy's head and striking the man on the left. The boy turns around to face the other man before Selina's strike has even finished. With the boy out of the way she takes a step forward and cracks her whip again, this time wrapping it around the man and pulling him towards her so he falls onto the ground. He gives out a pained grunt as his head bounces off of the floor, and goes boneless in the next instant. Another step forward brings her up to the man that had pulled the gun. She delivers a quick kick to his head as he struggles to rise again, and he joins his fellow in unconsciousness.

The boy takes care of his own goon quickly, an unnatural speed in the precise staccato movements he uses. When the goon is down for the count he turns around, and his hood falls to reveal a shock of red hair. The recognition is automatic, but it takes her a second to realize where that it comes from.

She recognizes him from Gotham, usually seen hanging around with the boy wonder. He isn't just anyone; he's Kid Flash.


	9. Chapter 9

Selina's seen cats with more meat on them.

What she can see of Kid Flash, his face and hands, look like a study in skeletal figures, an artistic exaggeration made physical. When he moves, fidgeting under her gaze, his clothes fall oddly pulling too far against the unseen mass beneath them before stopping leaving the impression of a hollow container.

He looks ready to bolt, eyes wide and panicked. Considering that she's the one who just stole something it's an unsettling situation. Normally _she_ would be the one looking for a quick exit.

She could just walk away, the Kid's obviously not going to stop her, doesn't even look like he would be a challenge if he tried it.

She could just walk away, and leave him to his own devices.

She could, but she's not going to. Nothing about this situation is sitting well with her. Damn it. Before Batman went and got a kid she had absolutely no desire to interact with the little creatures at all, and now here she is, a bleeding heart for one that she barely even knows like he's some sort of stray cat.

"So," she says, "you planning on turning me into the cops?"

"What?" His eyes snap to her, ending their quest for an escape route. Good, she has his attention.

"The cops. That's usually what you capes do when you come across a criminal, right Kid Flash?"

He swallows a little nervously at his name, but doesn't bother trying to deny it. "I'm not really a hero anymore. And.." he trails off, shoulders hunching in on themselves. His next words are almost a whisper, but they carry well in the old building. "I don't really want to be a hypocrite on top of being a thief."

She has questions - why the Kid is out here on the streets, how he got to where he is now, where any of the capes that should be watching out for him are - but she brushes them off for the time being. Things that are in the past can wait, she needs to get this right if she wants to make a difference.

"Well, now that puts me in a bit of bind Kid. See I want to believe you, but right now I have no reason to believe you're telling me the truth. Now if I knew you had a reason not to turn me in, an exchange of sorts where we do things for each other, then I could trust you not to tell. What do you say Kid?"

She is met with a blank stare of incomprehension.

"A bribe Kid. I'm offering you a bribe, and if you aren't a hero anymore there's no reason you shouldn't take it, is there?"

He's swaying a bit on his feet. Whatever reserves he may have seem to have been used up in the small scuffle, and she can see it affecting his thought process, his face scrunching up as he tries to work through what she said. "No?"

"Good. Come with me."

She kicks one of the men on her way out, making sure to keep an eye on the Kid in case he changes his mind.

Whatever is going on with the Kid that ended with him in this dilapidated building she's going to do everything in her power to help him.

* * *

><p>By the time they make it back to her penthouse (well, Henry Brick's penthouse; semantics) the Kid is practically asleep on his feet. Selina closes the window behind them, tosses the nights accusation onto a couch, and starts peeling off her cat suit on her way into the kitchen, dancing about on one foot and leaning against the center island to peel it off her left leg. A kick sends it flying through the air where it smacks against the dining room chandelier. Freed from her work clothes she goes to the fridge and pulls down a box of Choco cereal.<p>

The boy is still standing by the window, blinking slowly. "Your underwear is green."

"Yes," she agrees, "it is. Very good. Now sit down on the couch and eat this while I order us some food."

She calls a few take out places, trying to figure out how much food, exactly, he'll be able to eat, and wonders into the bedroom to pick out some comfortable clothes that are more appropriate for answering a door than either her underwear or her Catwoman suit.

When she comes out a few minutes later in a pair of sweat pants and an oversized T-shirt he's made his way through the cereal, and is sitting self consciously on the edge of the couch. He looks slightly more awake than he had been on the way there, and she isn't sure whether she should take that as a good thing or a bad thing. If he had just passed out she would be sure he at least spent the night somewhere safe, and she could avoid any of the difficult conversations her adult sensibilities are trying to tell her she should bring up. Things she knows could very well send him running.

She does a quick search through the kitchen to see if there is any other food, and ends up grabbing the cream (the clear superior to milk) out of the fridge for him to drink, and a beer for herself snapping the top of the bottle off against the counter top before she makes her way over to him. She hands him the cream, still in the carton, and takes a seat on the other end of the couch. Taking a swig out of her drink she motions for him to do the same. He pops the corner open and takes a long swallow leaving him with a small white mustache that he wipes off on the back of his hand.

The silence that ensues is the point and time that she, as a responsible adult (which she apparently became somewhere in the last hour or so), should ask him questions.

She doesn't. They sit and drink their drinks until there is a knock at the door. She gets the door, and comes back with the ridiculous amounts of Chinese food she had ordered, putting it down on the coffee table. She opens up one of the orders of fried rice, and grabs a pair of chopsticks sitting back down on the couch to start eating. "Help yourself, Kid"

He's not nearly as weary of her as he once was when he glances at her again, grabbing a plastic fork and one of the cartons at random to methodically demolish. "You don't have to tell me anything you don't want to," she starts. "That said, you want to tell me how you ended up squatting in a building in Chicago?"

He finishes of the last of the sweet and sour pork, and picks up a new carton, this one filled with chow mien, and shrugs. "It seemed like a better idea than crashing in Gotham."

"And I suppose not having to avoid Batman doesn't hurt."

He rolls and unrolls the noodles on his fork, and she almost expects him to deny it. "Red Tornado isn't much better, but it's easier to get stuff in big cities. Easier to blend in too."

"Kid…" she trails off. It's so damn hard to find the right words, if there are any right words. She can't think of anything good that would send a kid running like this, and if she wants to help him, which, damn it all, she does, she needs to know something about what she's dealing with here. "Did something happen? Did one of the capes-did they do something to you?" She feels a little sick just asking the question, but she's not naive enough to think that being a good person in one way stops someone from being horrible in another.

He turns to face her, and it's the first time he's looked her in the eye since they were in the old building. His face is scrunched up in disbelief. "What? No! None of them would do anything like, like _that!_ It's," he looks away again, and his voice comes out in a whisper. "It was my fault. I'm the one that messed up."

She tries to imagine him, the Kid that laughed at some of her worst cat puns, doing something that Batman, the man who still occasionally tries to get her to reform, won't give a second chance for. Something bad enough to make him leave behind every person he's ever known.

At the moment, with him hunched in on himself over his food, a look better befitting a kicked kitten on his face, it's a pretty hard thing to picture. And to be honest, no matter what it was, she still wants to help him if she can. That's not something she can see changing.

She finishes off the last of her beer, and lays her hand on his shoulder gently. "Kid, whatever happened, you don't deserve to be out on the streets like this."

"I didn't have anywhere else to go, they couldn't-" he's panting slightly, eyes blinking rapidly, and she can feel him leaning into her touch. "None one could keep me anymore. No one can ever keep me."

The food is left forgotten and she does her best to offer whatever silent comfort she can.

"I miss them," he says.

They finished their food in silence, and Selina has him take a shower, throwing his clothes in the washing machine and laying some of Henry Brick's out for when he's done. Selina sits on a bar stool in the kitchen sipping at her second beer while he showers, and tries to get her thoughts in some kind of order.

She still doesn't really know what happened with the Kid, and probably has more questions now than she did when she started talking to him. She can offer him a place to stay, and food to eat (though she's not sure he'll take the offer past tonight) but it stinks of a temporary solution. A band aid on a broken bone.

The Kid comes out, weaving slightly on his feet, and manages to just make it down onto the couch before he falls asleep, drooling on the armrest. She gets up and spreads an extra blanket over him. She has a few things to do before she goes to bed, but whatever tomorrow may bring she knows one thing for sure; sometime soon she and Bats are going to have a talk.


	10. Chapter 10

A/N: The good new - my plan worked, the writers block I had on this is now officially gone. The bad - I have run out of old parts I had written and you all will now be subjected to longer waits as I have to write whole new chapters for you instead of sprinkling old ones out over time.

* * *

><p>When Wally runs away Conner wants to tear the world apart. He wants to tear the world apart to find Wally. He wants to tear the world apart to find the person responsible for him being gone. He wants to tear the world apart because it's broken, and it mocks him by pretending everything is fine.<p>

In those first few days it's only the steady pressure of Black Canary's hand that stops him from trying.

Instead Conner tries to help. He isn't smart, and he isn't good at finding things, but what he is good at is listening. Conner listens for news, for some overlooked connection in the reports. He listens for hints, and clues, and for Wally's heart beat in the night.

Eventually life seems to go back to normal. The worry everyone feels for Wally seems to fade to the back of minds more, and more. Sometimes they even manage to carry on as if Wally was never there in the first place, as if he had never existed. The moments always gain a surreal edge to them when he recalls them later, an anomaly in an otherwise cohesive story.

Conner still listens, though he has less to listen to every day. He listens on and on, and one day, with just over six months past since Wally ran away, he realizes that he's spent more than half his life listening for Wally.

* * *

><p>A typical night in Gotham - dreary, dark, and dismal.<p>

A set of feet alight soundlessly next to Batman where he crouches next to one of the cities many gargoyles. "You know I think I might be developing a weakness for redheads. A month ago I had Ivy crashing on my couch, and now I've managed to find myself a stray Kid."

And, of course, full of surprises.

Bruce takes a moment to gather his thoughts, checking that the shipment Falcone's men are waiting for still hasn't arrived. Selina waits patiently enough off to the side, draping herself sinuously over the gargoyle.

"Kid Flash."

"Well he certainly isn't a goat."

Bruce can feel Selina eying him critically, and he wonders briefly what it is she's looking for. "How is he?"

"About as well as you can expect a metahuman living on the streets to be," she says, voice biting. "Hungry, tired, lonely. Seems to be under the impression everything is his fault."

Batman's hands flex against his binoculars in an attempt to ease the tension building in his body. "It wasn't. No one is blaming him for the situation." He takes a few tight breaths through his clenched teeth, and forces his muscles to relax one by one. "How long has he been staying with you?"

She sighs, pushing herself up and beginning to pace back and forth behind him. "Not long; a few days. And believe me getting him to stay for just that long was hard enough. Not sure how kindly he's going to take to all of this either, he seems pretty determined to keep away from all you capes." Suddenly she changes direction, coming to sit down on the ledge to his right. "Look, I want to help the kid, I do, but I can't do much of anything with what I know right now. He could be on the run for any number of reasons, and I am as sure as hell not going to hand him over to someone like he's a common crook."

Batman watches a truck pull up to the loading area, Falcone's men become alert and scrutinize it for authenticity. "He was involved in an altercation at his school. Extenuating circumstances then led to the intervention of a social worker concerning his behavior. It was made clear that she intended to remove him from his home for other placement, and when the situation proved difficult to resolve Kid Flash removed himself from it."

The sound of her hand coming up to cover her eyes where she rubs at them wearily is bright in the silence, but the men below carry on unaware. "Straight answers; it's like squeezing water out of a stone." Selina sighs, and straightens up. "Alright then, I'll see what I can do. Any messages you want to send?"

Batman turns to face her for the first time in the conversation. "Let him know that right now we just want to talk to him. We aren't going to do anything that he doesn't agree to."

They exchange a heavy gaze, both of them imagining a scared, flighty young man in their heads, both of them knowing that the slightest misstep could cause him to disappear. Selina nods, and turns around to leave.

"Selina, you need to gain his trust." She stops, and looks over her shoulder at him, a smudge against the smoggy Gotham night even at such a short distance. "His name is Wally"

She licks her lips, weighing the new information in her mind, wondering how many people's secrets are tied to the single name. "That could backfire you know. How much does he trust you?"

Enough, hopefully. "We'll find out."

Selina leaves, and he turns his attention back to Falcone's men, now unloading their shipment of illegal arms. He pulls out a batarang, and soon he's descending upon the frightened henchmen.

A typical night in Gotham where there's always something for Batman to do.

* * *

><p>Conner is doing his homework in the dining area with M'gann when he hears the Flash begin to yell at Batman. For a moment he thinks of going back to his homework and ignoring them. It isn't the first time he has heard the Flash start yelling, and chances are it's more of the same. He doesn't know that he wants to hear more of the same anymore. Still, between listening and economics homework…<p>

Staring blankly at his textbook Conner focuses in on their voices. The Flash is still speaking when the voices become clear. "- when it comes to _Wally_. Damn it Bruce, I'm not just going to sit here, not if someone has really found him!"

Conner's back stiffens in surprise, his heart attempting some odd contorting movement in his chest. He focuses on listening even harder until he can hear even the minute rustling of Batman's cape as he shifts. "We have to be careful how we approach this. Right now he's with someone we can trust to –"

"_Trust?_ Just because you want to _sleep_ with her doesn't mean we can trust her! For God's sake she's part of your Rogue Gallery."

"You should know better than most that not all criminals are the same. She's not like the others."

"The same way Harvey _wasn't like the others?_"

For a while all Conner hears is the Flash breathing heavily, and the small sounds of shifting bodies. "I'm sorry. That – that was out of line." The Flash takes in a steadying breath. "I'm supposed to look out for him, you know? He's my nephew, my partner. And now," the Flash laughs bitterly, "and now apparently one of your villains is out there doing a better job of it than I can, and I'm damaging every relationship I have in the mean time."

Conner hears Batman shift forward, and what he thinks may be Batman resting a hand on the Flash's shoulder. "Keep it as quiet as possible for the time being." Batman pauses. "We will get him back."

And with that it seems their conversation is over, the older superheroes moving on to speak of something else. Conner sits in silent for a few minutes more going over everything he has heard. This is what he has listening for those long months, this is the hints and the clues needed, and Conner can't make heads or tails of it. He isn't smart, and he isn't good at finding things; he doesn't know who Wally is with, or where they are.

But then, that's why he has a team.

"M'gann," he says, pulling her away from her own homework.

"When are the others going to get here?"

* * *

><p>The entire team is abuzz with the new news about Wally. Dick easily identifies the woman Wally is staying with as Catwoman, and the team begins to search for her right away.<p>

Finding information on her is hard. Catwoman is good at covering her tracks, and the security on her files is too good for Robin to get them unobserved. It doesn't take them long to figure out they need help, especially if they want to keep their self assigned mission a secret.

What they need is a specialist.

Barbra spins around in her computer chair so that she faces Dick were he sits on the edge of her bed. "You want me to hack into a security firm? What even makes you think that I could help you with this?"

"Come on Babs, you really think I wouldn't recognize your work on the whole 'Oracle' thing? No one else breaks code like you do."

Barbra rolls her eyes. "Flattery -"

"- will get me everywhere." Dick smiles at her, but it's tinged with just a bit of the desperation he's feeling. He's putting a lot on the line in asking for her help, and he doesn't know what he'll do if she doesn't, or can't, help him. "Please. I can't get the information myself, not without leaving a big neon sign, and I need to not leave any trace."

Barbra raises an eyebrow. "And if you do leave a trace you need it not to lead back to you."

Dick winces. "Yeah."

"Is this about your friend, the one who went missing?"

"I hope so."

It's not the first time that Barbra has heard Dick talk about his mysterious friend. She almost asks why he doesn't just go to the police with his suspicions, but while her father may be a good cop she's familiar enough with the bad ones to know his reasoning. Barbra sighs and starts to boot up her computer. "Well then, I guess it's time to get to work."

* * *

><p>It takes a surprisingly small amount of time for Barbra to get the file they need, and pin point a few possible locations for the woman mentioned inside.<p>

"This is great Babs. And you didn't leave behind any traces?" Dick takes the flash drive with the information on it from her hand, and gives her the kind of smile she hasn't seen on his face in weeks, at the least.

"Do I look stupid to you?" She does know what she's doing.

He laughs as he leaves, the awkward creepy laugh he gets when he's over excited.

Barbra rolls her eyes once he's out of sight. She didn't leave behind anything besides her usual notes explaining the weaknesses she had exploited to the firm. Nothing that would lead back to Dick at any rate.


	11. Chapter 11

The air is buzzing with anticipation as soon as Artemis steps out of the zeta beam into Mount Justice. Or at the very least M'gann is buzzing with anticipation, and the result is more or less the same. Artemis tries not to let it show as she walks through the hallway, keeping the click of her boots at a steady tempo. The last thing they need to do is raise any suspicion.

She checks to see if anyone is around quickly, pulls open one of the hallway doors, and steps inside Wally's room. She can still remember that first weekend after Wally disappeared when no one seemed able to clean the mess left behind by the Flash's frantic search, and the way that people would enter later, like they were on a pilgrimage, and slowly put pieces of the room back to right.

Now it sits pristinely, its sharp lines giving away Wally's absence just as loudly as the chaotic mess once did.

The others are already there, perched on various furniture in a half circle around the room. She hasn't missed much. Robin is just pulling up the files on the screen hovering in the middle of their circle. She slips easily into their mental link, and she can feel the different flavors of anticipation roll about in her stomach.

_How does it look?_

Robin frowns as he slides through the windows open in front of him. _Every report we have indicates that Catwoman has been exclusively in North America for the last four months at least._ _None of the locations left are specific. Cities, towns, but no actual addresses, and trying to find out the exact location of one isn't going to happen any time soon. Every location is going to require a large search grid._

Artemis falls to her knees, leaning forward to get a better look at the screen. There are five red dots blinking on the map of Northern America. One is in Mexico nestled along the Gulf Coast. Two in Canada: one just above the border, one high up in the icy ranges. In the US there is one dot in the east and one in the west.

_We've got to be able to narrow it down better than that, _she thinks.

Kaldur hovers his finger over the little dot in Mexico. _This section of the Gulf has been affected by several storms in the last weeks. It is unlikely that Catwoman would have been able to obtain transportation from this location to Gotham recently. _

A few swift key strokes dims the dot to a cool blue color. _We can rule out north Canada this time of year too, _Robin thinks, dimming that dot as well.

Conner's fists clench. _None of it's going to do any good if we can't get there to look for him._

At this point something its easier said than done. Batman has slowly been giving them more control over the missions. It's not something any of them would be complaining about during normal circumstances, but the time and effort involved in putting together missions, and going through retrieved data barely leaves them any for small meetings like these.

M'gann is wringing her hands together, and Artemis briefly wonders what she'll do after this to work of her nervous energy (the halls still have a lemony fresh sent from Kaldur's stay in the med bay a few weeks ago when she started washing the walls, everything else already tidied away in its proper spot). _If we only we had missions in the areas we could search for Wally at the same time._

Robin's face contracts for a second, and then blooms into the wicked smile that usually means he's placed explosives somewhere. _That,_ he thinks. _That might just work. We just need to find a low level mission and convince Batman that we should be sent on it._

_Of course, _thinks Artemis_. All we have to do is pull one over on _Batman_. What could be easier? Why didn't we think of that before?_

Kaldur gives an exasperated look. She smiles happily back at him, always glad to help him test his patience. _Sarcasm aside this does seem to be our best chance. Robin, can you cross reference these cities with the information we have been sorting through?_

Robin's fingers clatter against his keyboard. _Already done._

* * *

><p>They come up with and get the missions approved; something Artemis is certain required interference from Robin on the home front.<p>

Vancouver, their first stop, is a success only in that they manage to confirm one place Wally isn't, and in the spectacularly quick and boring mission they put together as a cover.

Chicago is next on their list. It's Red Tornado's city, so none of them are too hopeful, but any city known largely for a kind of food has to be worth checking out in a search for Kid Mouth.

They land, camouflaged, on a roof near the target building. Superboy separates from them with a nod. His superhearing and M'gann's telepathy are the two best ways to thoroughly search the city. M'gann stays behind, necessary for the mission at hand no matter how much of a farce it ends up being.

The four of them make their way over to the roof top. The building has an old glass ceiling designed to let light in, and presumably cut even more costs on whatever products were produced at the time. It's the kind of ceiling that makes it ridiculously easy for heroes like them to take a look inside, and they intend use it for just that.

There are several large machines throughout the interior. Artemis isn't sure what exactly they might be used for, but they certainly look evil in the dim lighting available to them. The vats look pretty suspicious as well, light blinking on their sides showing that they are currently in use. Nothing on first sight that screams out at her 'evil lair' so much as 'B grade horror movie set' though.

Robin unhinges one of the panes of glass, pulling it completely out of the sunlight, and M'gann flies in securing a grappling wire to the rafting so that she and Kaldur can follow, Robin jumping down unaided.

Robin flips ahead of them, jumping from one rafter to another with only the lightest touch of hand or foot in between. _The offices are this way._

Artemis exchanges an exasperated look with Kaldur, and they follow at a much more sedate pace.

The building is set up in an L shape, the offices and the factory each taking their own section, so Artemis has no warning for the sight that greets her besides Robin's sudden halt.

Below them gathering in silence for what appears to be some sort of prayer are over a hundred Cobra initiates.

Well, maybe the mission isn't going to be a total farce after all.


	12. Chapter 12

AN – My computer died a little while ago, meaning I'm on limited to any computer or internet. Fortunately I didn't loose much (the wonders of doing first drafts mostly handwritten in a notebook). It does mean that it will probably be a while before the next update, but it also means they should come a bit quicker when they start up again. As is you all probably would have had to wait a bit longer for even this, cause FF was being stupid about letting me edit things in their browser thing and I had to get creative, but it's my birthday and I feel like basking in some reviews, so I decided to take some of my free birthday do whatever I want even if I should be doing something responsible time to get things straightened out. XD

AN 2 – still not letting me put in the normal breaks, or letting me edit in my browser, but hopefully this will work for now

**Warnings **– This chapter probably touches the edge the rating a little bit, but it does it discreetly, and as far as I'm concerned if you can understand the implications taking them out for maturity reasons is a bit insulting, at least in a story like this, so rating stays the same.

**Implied survival sex, rabbit and other furry animal killing**

On with the story -

oOoOoOoOoOo

Wally looses track of time almost right away. He's never had the best sense of it to begin with, something only exacerbated when he got his powers, but living alone on the streets time turns into a completely foreign concept. The past only a reminder of what he no longer has, and the future a never ending question moving from one moment to the next.

None of it really matter when all you have is the present.

oOoOoOoOoOo

He hides in plain sight, in front of the eyes of a thousand passer bys. He hides in the layered clothes and dirty faces of the homeless. He hides in the overwhelming numbers of the unfortunate.

One, after all, is a tragedy; a million is a statistic.

And no one bothers a statistic.

oOoOoOoOoOo

Wally is always hungry. He's been that way for so long, even before food became the scarce commodity it is on the streets, that he can't legitimately remember what it's like not to be. It's such a normal thing that he can forget that the hunger is even there.

And he does – forget. He forgets long enough that his stomach goes quiet, and his body weak, and he has to lay down, too tired to keep his eyes open.

When he opens them his backpack, and everything he had that he wasn't wearing, is gone.

He gets to his feet, his legs weak beneath his body.

Nothing taken is horribly irreplaceable. He can get more clothes, another bag, one way or another.

The only thing he really misses is the gaunt little sock he had nestled at the bottom of the bag.

But then, it's nothing less than what he should have expected, remembered.

He doesn't get to keep anything.

oOoOoOoOoOo

He's out of food.

He tries to go to soup kitchens when he can, though it feels like painting a target on his back every time, but it's hard to find them while he's on the move, let alone finding them when they are open.

The first time he tries to steal food he's seen. His mind is muggy and he's light headed, too concentrated on the sirens call of food to really pay attention to his surroundings. A clerk comes up on him as he's stuffing a second sandwich in his jacket and grabs him by the wrist halting the movement.

"Filthy thief." The man's face is twisted into a horrid sneer; his already pug shaped nose wrinkling in disgust. His other hand pulls back behind his head to deliver a blow, and Wally reacts on muscle memory alone easily breaking the man's hold and pushing him to the ground. Second sandwich clenched in his hand Wally quickly shoulders his way through the store, breaking into a run when he's out of sight.

The run doesn't last long, and Wally finds himself panting on the side of a dirt road. He unwraps first one sandwich and then the other, forcing himself to eat as slowly as possible to try and trick his stomach into thinking there's more than there really is.

oOoOoOoOoOo

The fastest paths for running are free of any obstacles. Wally knows paths across the globe that might twist and turn, but offer up as much resistance as a running track.

When he moves from city to city he doesn't take those paths.

He runs from cluttered little tow to cluttered little town. He picks through paths in forests, and over mountains. He plays hopscotch across maps from one dot of civilization to the next.

The Flashes use the paths of least resistance. The quick and easy paths free of obstacles.

And Wally isn't a Flash anymore. 

oOoOoOoOoOo

He's in a new city, and he finds himself on a street corner. There are other runaways here, all of them bundled in overused clothing against the winter cold. There are other corners like it in or other cities, and Wally has figured out that they are the best way to get acquainted with each new cities ins and outs. This is where he learns of soup kitchen and shelters, places to squat and places to steal.

A plain van parks on the street not far from where Wally is standing and a man pulls himself out and starts walking over to the small crowd. At first Wally thinks he might be some sort of social worker, one of the people that occasionally comes to spots like these to hand out sandwiches and condoms, but the man is dressed a bit too well, and his posture is too demanding; he's here to take something, not give something away.

The chatter on the street falls silent, and every eye seems to watch the new comer with distrust. The man regards them all back, an easy swagger in his step. His eyes seem to darken when they catch sight of Wally's hair, grimy bet still obviously red, and his nostrils flare out as he begins to smile. Wally is reminded vividly of animals in which smiling is a form of aggression.

Wally's stomach gives off a pitiful growl. He's so fucking hungry. 

oOoOoOoOoOo

Wally gets better at stealing. A lot better actually.

Sleight of hand it turns out is relatively easy when you have super speed. His control gets better every time, his arms reaching out quicker than the eye can see while the rest of him wanders along at normal speeds. Being caught on tape is an occasional worry, but after covert ops missions' avoiding a few grocery store security cameras proves to be no challenge.

oOoOoOoOoOo

One day he passes a newspaper with a bright picture of The Flash on the front page. His stomach clenches on the stolen food in his gut, and he knows there's no way he can go back. He's a thief now; the kind of person heroes put in jail.

oOoOoOoOoOo

Sometimes Wally just wants to forget everything.

oOoOoOoOoOo

He puts everything away when he's done, the sharp grit of the asphalt and broken glass digging into his knees as he shifts. The man is leaning back against the alley wall, and his hand is still running through Wally's hair. Distantly Wally thinks he should make him stop, but his arms stay still at his side.

"You could come home with me. You'd have food, clothes, a warm place to stay."

Wally shakes his head, finally dislodging the man's hand, and getting back to his feet.

The man smiles as he pulls money out of his wallet, and it's odd because it almost looks like the smile of a man who actually cares. "Maybe next time you'll change your mind."

Wally takes the money, and decides it's time to move on to another city.

He thinks he likes stealing better.

oOoOoOoOoOo

Wally tries to stay in cities for the most part, where the crowds are thickest and the homeless more abundant.

Sometimes though, after a detour to stay off the radar, or on a run that takes just a bit too much energy he finds himself bedding down somewhere less populated.

He comes across an empty camping cabin one day, cut off from the main roads by a flooding river, and decides to forgo the rest of his run for a nearby city, breaking the lock on the door and hurrying in out of the heavy rain. There's a fireplace and a pile of wood, and soon he manages to get a fire started, stripping out of his dampest clothes to warm himself by it.

Some of the tension seeps out of his shoulders. For at least the one night he can sleep without needing to watch his back. 

oOoOoOoOoOo

Sharing squats is warmer, although he takes a chance with the other occupants when he does it. Not so much for his safety as for his hygiene. In squats people crowd the space, sharing body heat in the small rooms. Some of them are clean enough for all that they are sleeping on the streets.

Some though.

Some smell of piss and shit, reek of week old booze and jump with lice and fleas.

He scratches at the bite marks along his arms in the morning, and finds a public bathroom to wash so he can clean up a bit in the 's warmer sharing squats, and bad hygiene takes longer to kill you than the cold. 

oOoOoOoOoOo

The thing about hiding away somewhere distant, somewhere he doesn't have to worry about the people, is that he has to worry twice as hard about the food.

He recognizes a few edible plants on sight, but to make any sort of a difference he needs to be able to catch prey. The first animal that he catches is a rabbit. He holds it at arm's length by the scruff of its neck, and takes out a knife that he found in the cabin's small kitchen. It takes him a few tries to slit its throat, and the rabbit still jerks in his grasp desperately the whole time. It takes longer to die than he expected. He has at least as much trouble butchering and cooking it, and it ends up both slightly raw and with a few clumps of fur.

He's a bit better the next time, and the time after that. He learns to break the animals' necks when he impacts with them, the force of it usually killing them instantly (though a few still gasp for breath eyes shifting wildly in their head for a few moments before passing on). And while the cuts of meat certainly aren't professional they become more manageable, and less hairy.

In the end, no matter how good he begins to get at hunting, the energy that he puts into it is just too much, the time it takes to prepare the food too long.

He leaves the cabin behind and heads into cities once more.

It's more efficient. 

oOoOoOoOoOo

Sometimes he just wants to go to sleep, and he doesn't care if he ever wakes up. 

oOoOoOoOoOo

Heroes are easy enough to find if you have the urge. Fights are loud, and easy to follow to their source; even without the news vans, police, and thrill seekers that inevitably gather at the sights for the coverage and aftermath.

One day Wally gives into temptation. He follows the sights and sounds to the battle. He shuffles along in the crowd, and for a moment he watches members of the Justice League fight for Earth. Wonder Woman, Captain Atom, Green Lantern John Stewart, and Hawkwoman.

He's one face in the crowd. Lost in anonymity.

He leaves after a few minutes, picking his way back, and then walking up and down twisted alleys.

None of them see him. No one whips their head about with a sudden sixth sense, and rushes to take him back.

Wally tries to convince himself that's a good thing.

oOoOoOoOoOo

When Wally lived in Gotham Jake would take him down to the alley, and they would give whatever scraps they could to the cats like an offering. He still remembers the feel of a rough cat's tongue scratching across his palm as it licks away grease on his hand.

When Catwoman falls in on him, when she takes him back with her, and feeds him, he thinks for just a moment that maybe they remember too.

It's the only thing that has him agreeing the next morning when she talks about giving him a place he can come back to, where he can sleep, where he can eat. The only thing that has him willing to see what she really wants from him.

oOoOoOoOoOo

He doesn't stay with Catwoman all the time, not even every night, but it's enough that he starts to lose some of the circles under his eyes, and his skin is back to its pasty white instead of a grimy gray. 

oOoOoOoOoOo

Catwoman leaves for a while, and for two days Wally is the only one at the apartment. He stays inside almost the whole time, basking in the ability to just _be. _

The first thing she says when she comes back is, "My name is Selina Kyle." The second is, "Your name is Wally."

Wally might freak out for a micro second or two. He thinks that's completely understandable.

He doesn't have very long. His thoughts are interrupted when she speaks again. "I talked to Batman, he has a few messages he'd like me to give you, if that's okay."

Wally can feel himself hovering over an event horizon in the moment; two paths, distinctly different, laid out in front of him. 

oOoOoOoOoOo

Wally never gets tired of running.

But he's so tired of running away.

oOoOoOoOoOo

"What did he say?"


	13. Chapter 13

The resting heart rate for the typical adult human is 60-90 beats per minute. Smaller bodied humans, such as children, have higher resting rate heart beats. Physical exertion and other factors can increase the resting heart rate to, at maximum, 200 beats per minute.

Conditioned athletes can develop cardiac hypertrophy, the increase in the heart's muscle mass and pumping ability, which increases the efficiency of the heartbeat. Each beat pushes more blood, and delivers more oxygen throughout the body, resulting in a slower resting heart rate.

As a side effect of the Flashes superspeed their bodies become hyper-efficient. The metabolisms slow to process the most energy out of the food so as to keep up with the calories burned. Their hearts gain muscle, supercharging their blood with oxygen on every pump.

Robin once said the Flashes have the largest healthy hearts recorded. 

_Bah-Dump, Bah-Dump_

Conner is good at listening.

To him, every heart beat sounds a little different.

_daDom, daDom_

Wally's heartbeat, so much slower than other humans, but not quite as slow as either of the older Flashes, is easy to remember. 

_b-b-Bah, b-b-Bah, b-b-Bah_

It's the heartbeat Conner fell asleep to the first night out of his pod.

It's the heartbeat Conner breathed to the first few months when his anger seemed like a living thing.

_baDa'ump, baDa'ump_

There are over two and a half million people in the population of Chicago.

_Baa-daBuuum…_

_Baa-daBuuum…_

_Baa-daBuuum…_

Wally's heartbeat is one Conner can pick out of a crowd.

oOoOo

He's just, standing there.

He's leaning up against a brick building, his hood pulled down and hiding his face from Conner's view where he stands looking down from a rooftop opposite. There's a neon bar sign flashing into the night a few feet over from his shoulder, and the street light is too dim to completely reach him, casting just his worn shoes in the harsh yellow light.

There are other people walking along the street.

Just, just _walking._

They don't even seem to notice he's there.

Conner feels himself shaking, something rolling hot and cold in his stomach. It doesn't feel like anger, not like he's used to at any rate. He just, he can't stop it. The shaking starts in his chest, and makes its way into the catch of his breath, and the clench of his fist, and the blinking of his eyes, and the waver in his legs.

Conner watches him, loosing track of all time – has enough time even passed to lose track of? Has it been the moments or the eons that it seems? – when Wally pushes off from the wall for no apparent reason, and with quick lopping steps makes his way around to the side alley out of Conner's sight.

Conner's own heart beats loudly in his ears, and his concentration is tangled up somewhere in all the not quite anger in his stomach. He jumps over to the roof across the street, muscle memory from hours of training the only thing that rolls his body along in a smooth, non-structurally-damaging movement. He sprints to the edge of the building that lines the alley Wally walked down, and pears over the edge.

It's a dead end street, blocked in on three sides with tall buildings.

Wally isn't there.

Conner's heart won't _shut up_. It pounds along in his head and just under his skin, hot and cold dancing along in fuzzy pins and needles with each beat.

Wally is missing. Conner found him, finally found him after months and months, and now he's _missing_ and –

"Dude, are you freaking out on me?"

And Wally is behind him. On the rooftop.

Conner wraps his arms around Wally in something that is part hug, part hold, and buries his face into the sharp angle of Wally's clavicle bone through the layers of clothing.

Wally holds himself stiffly under the contact, a role reversal of almost every hug they have shared in the past. He winces a bit, and pats his hand on what he can reach of Conner's back with his elbows still pressed against his own side. "Okay, so maybe no freak out was asking for a bit much, but-aah- think maybe you can ease up the grip there big guy?"

Conner knows that he isn't using his strength on Wally. He's not crushing him or hurting him in any way. He has enough control to be able to tell that much.

He also knows that it's a grasp Wally can't escape, at least not without using his speed against Conner.

"Conner, dude?"

"I'm thinking."

Wally gives off a huff of broken off laughter, and sighs, slowly relaxing into Conner's embrace until he's leaning against the taller boy, the two held upright by each other's bodies.

Conner shifts his hand over so that one has a firm grip around Wally's wrist before he releases him from the hug, unwilling to let go completely.

"How did you get up here? You were down in the alley."

"I sped up the fire escape. Figured that we should probably talk before you tried to call anyone else in." Wally turns hopeful eyes on Conner. "You haven't told anyone else you found me, have you?"

"No. The others are all on a mission. I went ahead to start the search while they take care of it."

"A mission?"

"We made one up - Batman has started letting us plan some of our own now - and we made one up so we could search for you when we found out you were staying with Catwoman -"

"It's not -" Wally shifts uncomfortably, suddenly refusing to look Conner in the eye. After a moment Conner squeezes his hand lightly, and Wally looks up with a weak smile. "She lets me use her shower, and eat there sometimes, and she hasn't asked me to do anything for her in exchange. So, I mean, it's not that bad." Wally looks up at Conner imploringly. He's asking for something with his gaze, that unspoken part of language that Conner still doesn't have the firmest grasp on. Conner doesn't really care what Wally is asking for though, whatever it is if Conner can give it to him he will. He nods at Wally, and Wally visibly deflates at the sign of acceptance.

"So you guys aren't - I mean, Batman didn't send you guys to take me back or something?"

"No. We came to take you back ourselves."

Wally rubs at his head. "Conner, I don't...I'm not coming back with you. Not tonight at least."

Conner frowns, glaring at his feet. He's spent so much time looking for Wally, and now he's found him, and things are supposed to be _better_. It was supposed to solve things. "Why?"

Wally sighs. "It's complicated." He twists his hand around slipping Conner's grip down from his wrist to his hand, and pulls him to the edge of the roof. "Just promise me you'll warn me before you tell the others I'm here, and we'll talk, okay?"

Conner hesitates. Wally wants a warning so that he can get away from them, so that they don't bring him back. But Conner thinks about it, about forcing Wally to come back with them, and that feels just as wrong as the idea of leaving Wally on his own. "I promise," he agrees.

They sit down on the roof edge, feet dangling over the drop, and Conner peers down at the foot traffic below them. No one looks up, just like no one looked at Wally when he was standing down below. Conner doesn't understand how some humans can seem to go through their lives without really seeing anything.

"You know I guess, what happened?"

"The Flash told us. When you left."

"Yeah, I kind of figured." Wally leans back looking up at the starless sky. "When I go back, if I go back, I don't know man. Everything is going to be different. Things aren't just going to go back to how they were before, and," Wally sighs, "I don't know if those changes are ones that I can handle."

Conner shakes his head. "It doesn't have to change anything now that we know. None of us care, I promise."

Wally looks at Conner from the corner of his eye, mouth twisted."It always changes something," he mutters. "And anyway, that's not really what I'm talking about. I mean, I don't think I can go home. Not _home_ home, not to my parents."

"You could live at Mount Justice with me and M'gann."

"And then what?" Wally's free hand shoots out in a sweeping gesture, as though trying to encompass all of the uncertainties. "Change my name again? Pretend to be someone else? And still have to keep away from my parents while I'm at it. I mean, it's not that you guys aren't great, it's just, I don't know, at least out here I can still be Wally West. And things might not be nice, but it's the kind of not nice you know to expect." Wally's voice shifts into a dry tone Conner has come to learn indicates sarcasm, "I don't know if you've noticed but I don't really like change that much. I haven't exactly had many good experiences with it."

Wally closes his eyes, and shakes his head. "I mean it's not, it's not that I'm not ever going to do it. Batman's been talking, and there's _options_, and he says there are other things we might be able to work on." Wally smiles, a bit of amusement flying across his face and disappearing. "He said that they could maybe get Bruce Wayne to help out some, since he's such a big supporter of the Justice League, and if we figure that out, and there's lawyers and stuff." Wally shrugs. "I just need to think, man. I need to figure out what I want to do, and I can't do that if I come back with you now."

Above them the blinking lights of a plane begin to descend. Below them a man comes out from the bar, bundled up slightly from the chill still in the air, and lights a cigarette, the smoke spiraling up into the air and dissipating.

Conner listens to Wally's heart beat, and feels it in the thrum under Wally's skin where they are still holding hands, and he comes to a decision.

"Fine. Then I'm staying with you."

Wally blinks rapidly. "What?"

"I'm not leaving you. If you aren't coming back, then I'm staying here."

Wally's mouth hangs open at a loss for words, although it doesn't last long. "Con, you can't just run away to be with me. For one thing as charming as I might be _you_ are no Juliet."

Conner glares, choosing to ignore the second statement and the text book analysis of Shakespeare that appears in his head at the comment. "You said that we're brothers."

"Right, and I'm the older brother, so I take care of _you_. That's how these things work."

"Physically I'm older."

Now Wally is the one glaring. "Dude, no. That is so not –

Wally cuts off as Conner's hand squeezes his own, his eyes going off focus as M'gann's voice swarms into his head. _Conner! We need your help. The mission went bad, there were - Kaldur!_

The connection is suddenly cut .

"What's going on?" asks Wally.

"The others are in trouble."

Wally shuffles back and forth, and then nods to himself. He gets to his feet, pulling on Conner's hand as he does the same, and lets out a heavy breath.

"Okay then. Lead the way."


	14. Chapter 14

Bruce can't sleep.

It's a rarer event that one might assume with his particular nocturnal activities. Most days he manages at least two hours of solid rest, and whether through training or the happenstance of genetics this is more than enough for him to get by on. Usually he'll even manage a few extra hours in any given week during board meetings (something that happened on accident early on after his debut as Batman, but that he has found useful to continue).

Not now though. Now, for whatever reason, these small amounts of sleep escape him; have escaped him for a few days at this point.

When Bruce can't sleep he sees no reason not to be working, no matter what Alfred may have to say on the matter.

And working is exactly what he is doing. 

At the Watchtower.

Here he has plenty of things to work on, research to do, improvements to implement. Enough things to keep him busy for years to come. But inevitably he is drawn to the same case that has been gnawing at his mind since Selina alighted on the rooftop with him some weeks ago, the same one his mind turns over whenever he closes his eyes.

Wally.

The idea that Batman knows everything (an idea that is, perhaps ironically, more common among other leaguers than it is with the members of Young Justice) is an illusion. It's an illusion that is in place because what Bruce _doesn't_ know he knows how to _find_. And that means that, even though he has no qualifications, no past experience with such a thing, no actual knowledge at the outset, he is still the person best prepared within the league to talk with and figure out a workable solution for Wally.

Bruce is all too aware that he works his best when he distances his emotions. Bruce is all too aware of how much Wally mean to his family and friends. Bruce is all too aware of his own attachment to the boy formed somewhere in his talks to Barry, somewhere in the 'play dates' with Dick, somewhere in watching the boy grow up and grow into himself.

He's all too aware that, given the circumstances, there is no one better for the job at hand.

Mind once again gnawing at the details and research he has poured over, the half made plans and interventions, Bruce opens up some of the relevant files.

And finds something new.

oOoOo

Robin had held the most experience. In general and with Kobra.

But Robin's job on the mission had been, first and foremost, to get to the computers, to hack them, and to retrieve any useful information.

Robin, as a general rule, did not stay linked up while hacking, and so it had been this time.

And so while the others had fought Robin had done exactly that. He had found the computers. He had hacked them. And he had indeed found useful information.

Information about Kobra's top recruiter, information about the tests being done on the new recruits in an attempt to bring members closer to the snakes that they revered, information on the drugs created right in that warehouse. Information on a special recruit.

Information that may have proved even more useful if Robin had read it before he worked his way back into an air vent, and back to his team mate, and the fight they were entrenched in.

oOoOo

Barbara has met Batman a few times before, usually when her dad's work threatens to follow her home, but this is the first time she's ever walked into her room to find him waiting in the corner as she flips on the light. She pulls back a bit in surprise, and rams her shoulder into the frame of her door forcing out a short sound of pain and dropping the books she was holding.

"Barbara?" her father asks. "Everything all right?"

She glances over at her unexpected company. There's no reason she can think of for Batman to come to her instead of her dad, especially when he's just in the other room, and there are plenty of windows to their place that aren't attached to her bedroom. She can feel curiosity nibbling at the corner of her mind. What could Batman possibly want from her?

"Everything's fine dad, just bumped into something." Her dad chuckles at her, which really, that's just mean, but he doesn't come and check on her which _is_ what she wants.

Probably.

Barbara closes the door behind her, and turns to rest her back against it, shoving the dropped books off to one side with her foot. "So. Batman. What brings you by?"

She has her eyes zeroed in on his jaw, partly because it is a very nice jaw line, but mostly because she's been around him just enough to know that looking at the menacing eye lenses is no way to judge what kind of mood he's in, and so she just catches the twitch in his jaw before he speaks.

"I need information," he says. "Oracle."

Oh.

_Crap._

For a moment her body tries to draw into itself, she feels guilt begin to build in her stomach like she's a small child being scolded, but she forces her shoulders to straighten, and lifts her chin in defiance. Some of the things she's done as Oracle are, technically, illegal. She knows that. It would be kind of hard not to in her household. She also knows that Batman, especially before the U.N. sanctioned the Justice League under a special charter, has also done things that were, technically, illegal.

That doesn't mean they were wrong, and that certainly doesn't mean she's going to cower like one of the criminals in her dad's interrogation room. She strides over to her computer chair, forcing her legs not to wobble until they can turn to jelly beneath her when she sits, and spins the chair around to face Batman. The power she has as Oracle is connected, in her head, to sitting in this chair, and she can feel herself gain a little bit of real confidence now.

"You hacked into Justice League computers and stole a file. I need to know who it was for."

"I _what!_" Did she say something about confidence? She doesn't have confidence. She has sweaty palms, knocking knees, and a cracking voice that would do any pubescent boy proud.

"_Barbara_." Oh God. And that is the scary hot growly voice. She's dead. Batman is going to kill her. Her _dad_ is going to kill her. Batman is going to tell her dad. "I need you to think Barbara. Who did you get the file for?"

"I don't know! I didn't even know that I hacked into Justice League files."

"You copied a file. About a woman named Selina Kyle. I need you to think Barbra. Who could you have given that file to?"

Barbara froze. There was only one person that she could think of. One person who needed to not have anything traced back to him if it was traced back at all, who had asked for one single file, who had warned her not to leave anything behind.

Barbara opens her mouth, and stops.

If it was anyone else, anyone at all, she would give them up without a second thought. Giving up Dick feels _wrong_. Like somehow, even though this is most definitely not kids stuff, she would be tattling about some stupid little thing on the school yard and get him into disproportionate trouble.

Which is stupid. It's not like she's tattling to Bruce or Alfred, and the only thing she'll get for keeping quite is a slap on the wrist. This is The God Damn Batman, and it's a good possibility that someone's life is on the line while she's having a question of conscious.

Her eyes flicker involuntarily to a picture of her and Dick at the mathletes finals last year, and she's saved from any further debate as Batman's eyes quickly tracks her gaze and puts two and two together. "Richard Grayson."

Barbara bites her lip, but nods a confirmation.

Suddenly Batman's shoulders sag slightly, and he reaches up to put pressure against the side of his head where his temple must be letting out a tight breath. "We will be talking about this more. Understood?"

Barbara nods again, this time with a slightly hysterical edge to it, and Batman is gone, jumping out of her window and into the night before she even has a chance to think of anything else.

Barbara slumps in her chair, feeling her heart beating heavily in her chest and feeling the tingles of adrenaline pumping through her veins more heavily in the aftermath.

She turns on her computer and makes two notes to herself so that she will know none of the night's events were a dream when she wakes up in the morning.

_Start changing in the bathroom. Expecting unannounced visits through window._

_Never do Dick a favor again._

oOoOo

When Robin had entered the fight Aqualad and Artemis had already been taken down stuck inside the arching power of a containment unit. Miss M. had soon followed even as she had contacted Superboy to come back.

Robin did his best. He held his own and waited, but even he could not change the tide of all battles on his own.

And though Robin had experience fight Kobra that night they had not been alone.

oOoOo

Knowing for sure that the team is the one with the information on Wally and Selina is both a relief and stress. On the one hand it's not someone who is after either of them with malicious intentions; on the other this is exactly the sort of complication he had been hoping to avoid.

The flight to Chicago is over with quickly, but the minutes seem to stretch out anyways. He arrives at their location, landing next to the bio-ship, and sends out a discrete signal to the team's coms. There's no response. All five signals are coming from the building that the mission specified, and so Batman makes his way quickly across the rooftops to the target.

He can hear the faint sounds of a battle coming from within.

He enters to find the team struggling to gain their feet, a group of Kobra initiates fighting to do the same all around them. On man, obviously the leader of this branch of the cult, is gathering together items in preparation of fleeing.

Batman descends.

He takes down the leader easily, the man crumpling as Batman lands, and a few quick flicks of the wrist coral the largest grouping of Kobra initiates, rope wrapping around and securing itself with its own momentum. The team, though obviously worn, takes down the others quickly enough when their numbers diminish.

oOoOo

When Superboy had come he had done so with Wally in tow, and Robin had been exhilarated. Superboy had gone in one direction, and acting on patterns older than even the team, ones that Robin's body had not forgotten even after long months of absence, Robin had fallen in line with Wally.

But while Robin's body had not forgotten the old rhythm of fighting side by side, Wally's had.

Robin had moved in one direction, _knowing _where Wally would be, only to find that he was wrong.

oOoOo

Abra Kadabra had come for the promise of real power, real magic that would be laid at his figure tips if only he should join the Cult of Kobra.

But this, this is turning into so much more. This is turning from the vague promises of power to be delivered, into the sweet taste of _revenge_, hot, sweet, _immediate_ upon his tongue.

The Kobra agents, the other child heroes - both fighting him and already captured, withering in pain inside his traps; he doesn't give a single solitary little fuck about any of them, not when his gaze catches on the gaunt but still unmistakable figure of Kid Flash.

There is a smudge of dirt across Kid Flashes face, and it is easy to picture it instead as the dark brown red of dried blood, easy to envision the slightly sunken features as resulting from death and decay rather than obvious malnourishment, easy to paint the green eyes into a wonderful glassy gaze.

The boy runs around, helping his little friends, and with every step he takes, every movement that is so much sharper and precise than he has ever seen a Flash move before, Kadabra can feel an inevitability growing. The fantasy of this child who has so routinely made a fool of him over the years dying under the brute force of Kadabra's hand is not a new one, but never has its fulfillment been so close.

Kid Flash stops for a moment, leaning against a wall, breathing heavy and limbs shaking. He is weak, and Kadabra is opportunistic. Several pathetic Kobra members make a charge at the Bird, and the Super is easily distracted by the screams of Kadabra's captives as he turns up the intensity of the fields surrounding them.

And for once, as Kadabra unleashes a single metal orb into the air that releases an intense pulse and a bright light, Kid Flash is too slow. The pulse knocks Kid Flash to his knees, the light blinding him to the attack that follows, and Kadabra moves across the room so quickly that he almost believes he has gained his own superspeed. Kadabra reaches down, giving the moaning body one more hit so that it falls limp to the floor, and lifts Kid Flash's body into his hands.

Just before Kadabra opens a pathway, bending space together to step directly into one of his hideaways, he catches the expression on Robin's face.

And he can't help but to laugh.

oOoOo

Batman turns to the team and looks them over for any serious wounds. All five of them are in one piece, though they hold a defeated air about them.

He's glad to know that he has arrived in time to stop them from their search.


	15. Chapter 15

At this point Robin is used to briefings before missions. The routine of gathering before going out on a mission is calming, grounding.

Standing here with the others, preparing for the first time to give their own briefing to a room full of Justice League members is a completely different thing.

And that's not even taking into account the subject matter.

Kladur steps forward slightly as the last person they were waiting for enters. The Flash, off world to help the Green Lantern Hal Jordon with a delicate situation, is noticeably absent.

"Batman is currently pursuing a secondary course of action; we shall be briefing you all on the current situation." It's easy enough to pick out a few unhappy expressions, but no one makes any protests. Robin wonders if any of them can see the tensing in Kaldur's shoulders and clench of his gills. "As you all know Kid Flash has been missing for several months after running away from his home. Three hours ago we made contact with him. Shortly there after he was captured by Abra Kadabra."

_And it was our fault,_ Robin thinks. Their meddling, their confidence that the mission would be nothing but a cover, their bumbling incompetence when things got serious.

A ripple of movement runs through the room at the words, but no one makes a move to speak, to interrupt. The silence rings in Robin's ears. It's the right response, the professional thing to do. Any interruption will only delay their response, especially at this stage in the debriefing.

He remembers suddenly that Wally was never quite during briefings, even when it was serious, even when it would have been more professional to remain so. But then, as a result, even those serious moments, those ones that should have been suffocating with their importance, they never held the tension that they have without him.

Robin steps forward, pulling up Kadabra's profile on the large screen, a mug shot filling one corner. Kid Flash is mentioned often, from his first appearance to more recently when he used the Helmet of Fate. "Considering Kadabra's – history – with Kid Flash," says Robin, "it is imperative that we find him as soon as possible." He pulls up a particular sub file, watching as it opens up across the screen. These pictures are of a different sort, pictures taken by police and in hospitals detailing the injuries of Kadabra's victims. "His profile indicates a strong need for revenge, and an inclination towards torture. We have every reason to believe that he will want to keep Wal-" Robin's voice catches in his throat, "keep Kid Flash alive as long as possible."

Robin's hand trembles slightly, and he closes it into a painful fist to make it still. They are _counting _on Wally being tortured. He his eyes behind his sunglasses, glad to have the slight protection against his own emotions as he pulls them back down.

M'gann picks up the thread next. "While Abra Kadabra is seen more often outside of Central City and Keystone than other villains of the area it has been and continues to be where he keeps his base of operations. He _is_ somewhere within the greater Central City-Keystone area. Because he has access to extremely advanced technology through time travel we can expect his lair to be well hidden, possibly out of phase with the normal structure of its location."

Robin pulls yet another file onto the screen, this one detailing what they know of Kadabra's technology, and speaks again. "Central City and Keystone both began as manufacturing cities around the industrial revaluation, the Missouri River separating them acting as a natural shipping route. In more recent years there has been a decline in the industries, and with the presence of the Flashes and the opening of the Flash Museum the cities have instead become major tourist attractions. The warehouses, now abandoned, provide the idea location for criminals to hide."

"These locations," says Kaldur, "are where we will be focusing our search. Covertly. If Abra Kadabra discovers that we are searching before we are near enough to intervene it may set him to his end game early. We shall be split up into five groups spreading the skills that can be used to detect Kadabra's location evenly among the them."

Robin can feel Kaldur and the others tense farther in preparation for the next part, the important part.

"Each search party shall be led by a member of Young Justice."

In the crowd Guy Gardner, another Green Lantern who is taking Hal Jordon's place on Earth for the duration of his mission, snorts. "Look kid, I listened to you while you told us what was up, but we ain't having search parties led by some wet behind the ear sidekicks."

Kaldur bows his head, and Robin feels his heart drop. Their best chance for this to work is by having the search parties organized and operating in sync, and if there is any question about who the leader is it will only take away from that.

Kaldur's shoulders fall back, and his eyes meet the glowing eyes of the Green Lantern. "Yes," he says firmly, "you will."

Guy Gardner blinks, apparently taken aback by Kaldur's directness, or maybe by the lack of reaction to the dreaded s-word.

"We are the ones trained in covert missions, and we are the ones that can work in tandem while working separately. We are the best choice for this, and therefore we _will _be the ones to do it."Kaldur raises his head fully, and lets his gaze sweep across the crowd. "I believe, should you have a problem with this, that the expression is 'tough luck.'"

A figure dethatches itself from the crowd, and starts to walk away.

"Red Arrow!" Green Arrow pushes through next, and now Robin can see that the first figure is indeed Roy. Roy turns slightly to acknowledge Ollie. "Where are you going? You can't be leaving?"

Robin would like to say that he knows Roy is rolling his eyes under his mask because of the years they have known each other, but he finds it's the first expression most people learn to recognize on Roy. "I don't know if you were listening, but it sounds like I'm a little over dressed at the moment." He plucks lightly at his uniform, just in case Ollie missed the point. The only ones not in costume are the members of Young Justice. "I figured I would change while you lot finish whining."

Roy and Kaldur catch each others gaze, and Kaldur nods in gratitude. "We will reconvene in five minutes, and separate into teams."

Ollie nods, and turns to follow Roy, a skip in his step to catch up as Roy pointedly continues down the hallway without waiting for him. Black Canary splits off from the others next, and soon all of the members unable to change their appearance or costumes without the aid of another set of clothes are leaving the room.

Guy Gardner makes a huff of irritation, but powers down, his Green Lantern uniform disappearing to leave a pair of jeans and a sports jacket.

_This is good,_ thinks M'gann through the mind link. She's chewing on the corner of her lip, and Robin wonders when she picked up such a human habit. _We're going to lead the search teams, and that's, that's good. Right?_

_Yeah,_ thinks Artemis, _as long as we don't screw this up too._

Conner frowns, harder than he already was; Robin doesn't think he's stopped frowning since Wally was taken. He doesn't blame him. _Batman believes in us. He thinks we can do this._

They all glance at each other, nerves fighting their way through and dancing along the mind link as clear as any thought, and then Kaldur moves in, closing the unintentional circle they have formed. He places his hand over Artemis's shoulder and squeezes softly. _Batman is not the only one that believes in us. And his belief is not unfounded. We will go, and we will find Wally. We will succeed. We will succeed because it is what we have been trained to do. We will succeed because Wally is our friend, our teammate. We will succeed because in this there is no other option._

Robin can feel everyone's nerves die away one by one, a feeling of resolution sliding into place. They meet each others eyes as people begin to filter back into the room dressed in civilian clothes.

_Lead well my friends._

oOoOo

Selina adjusts the earpiece under the hood of her costume again, already beginning to hate the thing.

"Stop touching it."

Selina's lip curls. "I'll stop touching it when it stops being annoying. Of course, considering that _your_ voice keeps on insistently nagging at me through it that doesn't seem to likely to happen."

Batman doesn't respond in a way that obviously indicates he thinks she is being childish. She huffs in response.

"You're here."

Selina stops, and looks around, almost missing the dank little stairway leading down to a tiny red door.

"Well then, looks like I'm about to have a date with some Rouges."


	16. Chapter 16

Some cities are nocturnal, but for the most part that's not Central or Keystone; not even its criminal elements. Generally speaking their crimes get done somewhere along the course of a regular business day, and while it might not make sense at first glance, its working pretty well for the moment. Cold counts through the loot The Brothers Gruff picked up in their afternoon heist. It's a pretty good sum, especially considering the guys are newer at the gig. Bridge tolls are apparently a more lucrative grab than Cold would have thought. He does a bit of quick math in his head, and pulls out the Rouges cut of the take.

He hands the rest of the loot back to the youngest of the three Brothers Gruff. "There you go, kid."

The kid smiles, THE look of admiration shining in his eyes highlighting the creepy ass rectangle pupils all of the Brothers share. "Thank you sir, it was an honor. I hope we can work together again." Cold barely resists the urge to strangle the kid long enough for him to trot back over to where his siblings are celebrating on the other side of the bar.

Cold falls back into his seat at their regular table, strategically placed with easy access to both the main and back door, and with a large mirror decorating the wall behind the booth.

Heatwave stifles a chuckle, and Cold turns a glare in his direction. He holds up his hands in defense. "What, I didn't say anything."

Weather Wizard rolls his eyes, and takes a sip of his drink. "At least we got a pretty good haul in today. And with the Flash out of town our heist worked as more than just a distraction for kids like the Billy Goats over there. Why, it almost makes me miss the challenge." Heatwave makes a noise like he's trying to swallow his own tongue. "What, I did say _almost_."

Heatwave shakes his head. "Not you." His mouth takes on a leering grin, and he points back towards the main door. "_Her_. "

There, leaning back against the door and surveying the entire bar through half lidded eyes Is a leather clad female figure sporting a tail and a pair of cat ears.

"Bloody hell," says Captain Boomerang, "is that who I think it is?"

"Well," says Mirror Master, "I'd say it's either one of those people likes dressin' up as animals to get their jollies, or that there, is Catwoman."

Cold watches her prowl up to the bar, sizing up every man she comes across along the way, and every man she comes along offering themselves up for it like an eager puppy. She arches her back and leans in over the bar counter giving the bartender her order. "Personally I'm hoping for the first."

Across the table Piper's nose scrunches up. "That was much more than I needed to know."

"Not that I'd say no to a nice looking woman, but that's not exactly what I was thinking. Mark my words; no good news comes from anything related to Gotham."

The bartender comes back with her drink, and after a small conversation he gestures in their direction.

James bounces up and down in his seat, moving his hands so he Is repeatedly sitting on them, something they haVE finally managed to get him to do when he feels like flailing them about, and saving them all from getting whacked in the head by an over excited limb on numerous accounts. "Ooh, ooh! You should offer her some of your milk! Cats like milk!"

Piper frowns. "James, you haven't been feeding the cats around the hideout milk have you? Cats are lactose intolerant; milk makes them sick."

"But they ilike/i it!"

Cold downs the rest of his milk. On principle.

Catwoman, because at this point there's no reason to even bother hoping it's someone different, is about halfway to their table. Cold rubs at his temples and wonders if they ever have conversations like this in Gothom. Somehow he rather doubts it.

She reaches their table snagging a barstool with a foot and dragging it over to sit down. Before this moment Cold was not aware that you could sit provocatively on a bar stool. But apparently you can. Off to the side Piper is reassuring Trickster that they'll get the cats a special milk that won't make them sick.

Cold nods to her in acknowledgement. "Catwoman."

"I hear you boys are the ones to talk to when a gal has business to conduct around here." There is nothing about that sentence that should make Cold think about sex, or entertain the idea that he has the flimsiest chance in hell of getting anywhere with the woman in front of him, and yet something in her voice still manages to plant the idea in his head.

Judging by the looks on the other Rogues faces he isn't the only one either.

And maybe that trick would have softened him up when he was younger, but the idea of sex isn't quite enough to change him into a brain damaged lout anymore. Most of the time at least. "Depends. What business are you conducting?"

She tilts her head to the side, and the hand still clutching the drink she had gotten from the bar begins to move, swirling the dark liquid around in the glass tumbler. Ultimately she seems to come to some sort of decision. "I'm here to find Abra Kadabra. He took something; I'm taking it back."

Abra Kadabra is pretty much the lowest villain on Cold's totem pole in all of Central and Keystone, and he knows that the other Rogues feel about the same. Abra pushes limits and treads thin lines, and there have been a few times that they have been close to dealing with him on their own, but he has never quite pushed that far.

And even if he did one thing that the Rogues ain't is stool pigeons.

Piper puts on the fakest smile Cold has ever seen him wear, and the usually friendly Rogue's voice comes out crisp with disdain. "That's all very nice, but if you haven't noticed none of us," a hand waves expansively around the gathering at the little booth, "are the man you're looking for, are we?"

She smiles sharply. "Trust me, if you were our business would already be concluded, and you would be none the wiser." She brings the tumbler up to her lips, and tilts the glass lightly to sip at it. There is a tear of liquid on the corner of her mouth, and her tongue laps out across her upper lip in a slow movement that makes Cold a little hot under the collar. She puts her glass on the table and leans across closer to Piper, her chest pushed forward once again in a way that is entirely too pleasant. "Of course, if you can tell me where he is I'm sure we can come to some sort of – arrangement."

Piper stands up enough to meet her half way over the table, leaning in next to her ear. "As flattering as I'm sure that is," he whispers, "you're not my type."

Piper sits back down, leaving a Catwoman leaning over the table with her mouth half open in shock. The Trickster laughs full heartedly, and around the table the others can't help but to release a few chuckles of their own.

Cold has never cared one way or another what other people do in their own bedrooms, and the closest he's ever come to making a stand on the issue was chasing out a few crooks and knocking a few heads together that had the wrong idea after Piper came out of the closet, but suddenly he has never been happier that Piper is into other blokes. If god forbid they start having to deal with something like this on a regular basis it will be nice to have someone that's immune to these kinds of attacks.

Catwoman lets out a huff of irritation, and slumps back into her seat, no longer exuding temptation like a forbidden fruit or an unsaid pun.

Mirror Master coughs, and seems to regain enough of his senses to put in his own two cents. "No offense broad, but you got no leverage around here to work off of. We may not like Abra, but that don't mean we're going to hand him out to the first person who comes into town with a score to settle."

The gaze she levels on him is biting in an entirely different way than it had been before. "Me? No. I don't have any leverage here. But then, I never said he took something of _mine_, did I. I was just, let's say the custodian, for an acquaintance of mine from Gotham. And while you might not care if I start rummaging around your town looking to 'settle my score' I can guarantee you that when they come, and they _will_ come, they will tear this place apart, and they won't give a rats ass about your 'rules' and what's going to be good for business."

Fuck.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. _Fuck._

Gotham is an insane place. An insane place that even insane people stay away from if they can, because it is _insane_, and if there is even the possibility that she's telling the truth and Abra is about to pull in a shit ton of crazy down on their heads then there is no way that the Rouges can _not_ do something about it.

This is something they're going to have to check out for themselves.

Cold glances at the other Rouges. For the most part it's grim faces all across the board, but Tricksters eyes are wide and shaky, his face pale beneath his mask like he's been listening to horror stories around a campfire all night long. Considering some of the stories out of Gotham, and the Tricksters wild imagination, it's probably not too far off base. "We don't know exactly where he is, but we know some places you can start looking at. Heatwave," he gestures to Heatwave, just in case she doesn't know who he's talking about, "will show you around."

"I will?" Cold, never one to repeat himself if he can help it, raises an unimpressed eyebrow. "I mean yeah, sure. I'll – uh – show you all the places I know of where he might be." Heatwave raises his own eyebrow in confirmation, and Cold nods.

She narrows her eyes at them. "That's it?"

"Take what you can get, sheila," advises Boomer.

She watches them for a bit longer, measuring them, and then walks out, Heatwave scurrying out of his seat to catch up. For a few minutes they stay silent.

The Trickster is the one who breaks the silence, his voice coming out uncharacteristically soft. "I don't want someone from Gotham to come break our cities."

As much as he annoys them Cold can tell he isn't the only one to get angry at the meek tone the idea has caused the Trickster to take. "They aren't going to; because we're going to make sure they don't have a reason." Cold turns to Mirror Master. "Take a walk, find where Abra really is. Once you scry out his location we'll give him a little visit, and if we need to we'll give him a little reminder why these are _our_ cities."

And hopefully the wild goose chase he had Heatwave lead Catwoman on will keep her occupied long enough for them to figure things out before they escalate.


	17. Chapter 17

In a long line of crappy and emotionally trying days this one takes the cake. Wally really wishes it didn't, because god could he eat some cake right now, but it totally does.

Waking up to a pounding headache that makes remembering recent events a little fuzzy, gagged, and hanging from his wrist in the dark like a peeking duck in a Chinatown shop window tends to do that though.

Oh god, _duck._ Crispy skinned with a sweet layer of fat and juicy dark meat, and _damn_ but Wally is hungry, and this train of thought isn't doing anything to get him out of his situation and closer to actually eating something.

_Focus._

Catalogue the details.

The area all around him is dark, but he strains his eyes against it and shapes begin to reveal themselves. There's a catwalk jutting out to his left, a tangle of rigging placed seemingly at random. Above him there seems to be a whole array of unlit lights in all sorts of sizes and configuration. Below him is a pretty decent drop, not enough that it would kill him, but maybe enough to break a leg if he lands wrong.

Still, if he can manage to get out of his restraints, or maybe loosen whatever riggings are suspending him in the air, it's not an option he's going to pass.

He pulls himself up carefully, taking in greedy breaths as a pressure he hadn't quiet recognized loosen in his chest even as his body protests the strain on his muscles and lack of energy. Eventually his face is level with the restraints around his wrists.

Too oddly smooth metal bands are wrapped around his wrist, pushed and held slightly apart by some unseen force. There is some kind of give to them letting them move slightly back and forth, but the only thing they seem to actually be attached to is Wally. Some sort of force field then holding him in place. Something that is a lot harder for him to get out of than your standard rope job, although it does seem to have the bonus of not biting into his skin and restricting blood flow even with the whole weight of his body puling on them.

Something about the metal catches his eye, and he works to hold himself steady, abdominal muscles clenching fiercely. He recognizes the design.

It's Abra Kadabra's technology.

He definitely isn't going to get out of these by conventional methods, but maybe if he can vibrate the right way?

Crap, ow, no. Weather Wally just can't do it right, or if Kadabra made the cuffs so that he can't escape them that way, a possibility Wally can't deny, he isn't getting out of them by vibrating. And the attempt did nothing but take up more of the little energy he has.

Wally lets his body fall slack again, a grunt of noise caught behind his gag. With his arms above his head once more a pressure settles back in a band across his chest, but for the time being he does his best to put it from his mind.

How did he end up captured by Kadabra? He had been in Chicago, not doing superhero type things, and then – crap, and then Conner had shown up, and then the team had been in trouble, and then – Kobra? And Abra Kadabra?

Well, he _has_ seen weirder things.

But whatever they had been up to together it doesn't look like Kadabra stayed around. It certainly doesn't look like a warehouse in Chicago or a Kobra Cult Convent or something.

It also looks like Wally is the only one that Kadabra has captive.

Wally really hopes that that's a good thing, that it means the others got away.

Maybe if he's lucky it'll even mean that help is on the way. The whole getting out of this on his own thing isn't looking very good at the moment.

Any other thoughts are cut off as the overhead lights turn on, blinding Wally. He hears the swish of fabric moving in front of him. His body wobbles slightly as the cuffs lower him down so that his feet barely touch the floor, offering some tentative relief.

Not _just_ a floor though, a _stage_. With the lights on and velvet curtains drawing open the old theatre is starkly lit, old cracked gold filigree shining dully.

A slow clapping draws Wally's attention to the front and center seat in the audience. Abra Kadabra lounges across the slightly frayed upholstery. An odd cane lies across his knees. "Kid Flash. How nice of you to drop in."

Wally tries to open his mouth to retort, no doubt scathingly, only to be caught short by the gag.

"As you can see I've acquired quite the venue for us." Kadabra stands up, flapping one hand about in what Wally is sure he thinks is an elegant manner.

He can't respond.

"Perfect, I think, for the performance we'll be enacting tonight." Kadabra begins walking up a set of invisible steps. He comes up besides Wally, much too close for comfort, one hand ghosting violently over his left check.

All Wally can do is hang there, glaring. And listen.

Kill him now.

Kadabra leans close and whispers in Wally's ear. "Your ifarewell performance./i"

Wait, what?

He takes it back. Wally is _totally_ okay with being killed at a later date.

"But first, now that I've managed to get through the introduction uninterrupted, let's take of the gag. After all, half the fun is going to be hearing you _scream_."

oOoOo

The technology that Abra Kadabra brought with him from the future is unique, and a part of that uniqueness is the exact composition of the metals used in their construction. A composition that has, among other things, a very distinct way that it reflects light and images.

An amateur when walking through the mirror world will try and navigate through the reflected landscape, the twisted representation of the world outside. Mirror Master is no amateur. The real way to get through the mirror world in a hurry is to walk through the places of nothing. The gaps between reflections where the mirror world just – stops.

And it's this way, winding through the highways of absence, that Mirror Master travels through Central until he finds the unique spiraling reflections of Abra's tech and the double layered prism of a place on top of a place that indicates phasing technology is in use.

Lip curling in satisfaction Mirror Master reaches into one of his pockets and carefully sets down a beacon.

Wally thinks the cane might have been some sort of prop. It doesn't look like something Kadabra would usually carry around. It has a black finish, and it looks like the main part of it might be made out of some kind of wood. One of those heavier sturdy ones. The bottom has a little cap of brass on it, and the top has this matching horse head figurine, one of those ones that looks like it would be kind of funny to grab onto but that actually fits perfectly against the curve of a hand.

Kadabra pulls the cane back, and swings it into Wally's side. The force of it pushes the air from Wally's lungs in strangled grunt, but somehow he manages to keep his feet under him.

Right now the cane would probably only work as a horror prop considering the blood on it.

That little horse head is sharp.

But between bruised ribs and the position he's in Wally finds that he's a little bit more concerned about breathing than bleeding. Every breath seems to take a little bit more effort, to sap a little bit more strength. And any time he loses his footing it becomes ten times as hard, little dots swimming in front of his vision as his chest refuses to expand and let air fill his lungs, a surge of primal panic sweeping through his veins.

He's not sure how much longer he's going to be able to hold on.

Kadabra steps back, a crazy grin on his face, and laughs. Some of his hair is coming loose from his ponytail framing one side of his face oddly. His eyes are completely blown, wild looking. With blood splatter decorating his shirt and across the open V of his chest the overall appearance is far gone from the composed, aloof look that he always seemed to try and project whenever Wally has seen him committing crimes in the past. "You know," he says, "for all the flaws of this time period there is something about the hands on experience."

There had been a few moments, right after he had taken the gag off, where Wally could talk back, deflect.

It had only taken being lifted a few inches into the air, and a hand pressing his shoulders down and forward compressing his lungs even more to convince him that he had better things to save his breath for. The only sounds he's allowed to make are sounds of pain.

The greatest defiance that he can muster now is lasting long enough that someone (and he'll take anyone at this point, _anyone has to better than this_) can come and find him.

Conner, the team, they had been searching for him before. Surely they'll keep looking for him now. They _have_ to know Kadabra has him.

Kadabra brings the cane back again, angling it so that the arc of the swing will hit his legs. Wally closes his eyes, and tries to prepare himself for the pain and the sudden constriction, the horrifying inability to breath, that comes with the lost footing.

His legs shake, reminding him that it won't be long before he loses the strength to keep himself upright and breathing even without Kadabra's help. A surge of panic wells up in him at the thought making his breath hitch, and his muscles spasm even as he tries to fight it down. He just needs to hold on.

Just a little bit longer.

_Please,_ let it only be a little bit longer.

oOoOo

The mirror world is wonderful for a lot of things, but it's actually spotty at best for spying on people, especially people that are aware someone from the mirror world might want to come along and spy.

Kadabra is one of those people.

So while there had been plenty of shiny reflective objects to use as a door into Kadabra's hideout, since the prick has always been to flashy not surround himself with shiny shit (not that Mirror Master can entirely blame him, the need to grab a bunch of shiny ass shit is what got a lot of them into this business), they don't have any views of whatever it is they'll be jumping into the middle of.

But their sudden appearance should still give them at least a momentary advantage. And for someone who battles the Flash on a regular basis a momentary advantage is more than enough.

With one last look to make sure everybody else is ready Mirror Master grabs hold of them, steps through the small golden reflection, and because Abra is a pompous showboat, straight onto a stage.

Turns out they aren't the only ones with an element of surprise, because the sight that greets them is nothing like they had expected.

There's a fucking kid. When the Cat said Abra took something she was talking about a fucking _kid_.

Cold is the first one to move, always the fastest one on the uptake, the one that makes the snap decisions. Two long strides carry him to Abra's side and his hand wraps around the cane he's beating the kid with on its backstroke, an audible smack of skin echoing through the theatre.

"I think it's time we had a little chat," says Cold.

Of course Abra is used to fighting the Flash too, and if he wasn't going to like what they had to say to him before (which he wouldn't have) he certainly isn't going to like what they have to say to him now. And he knows it.

Abra drops his two handed hold on the cane, his left elbow coming down sharply and throwing off Cold's aim with his gun, his right reaching somewhere on his person to pull out a weapon. He steps away as he spins to face them, and Cold pivots so that he's standing in between the boy and Abra. Abra goes to fire, but the Trickster's yo-yo arcs out and begins to wrap itself around Abra's arm before he can follow through on the blow. The yo-yo disintegrates against Abra's force field, but not before the Trickster manages to yank Abra farther away giving them all more room to move.

Weather Wizard and Captain Boomerang take the opportunity to fan out creating as much of a circle around Abra as they can. Mirror Master uses his own hard light constructs to fill in the space left between his four fellow Rogues.

"This is low even for you," says Weather Wizard, the echo of lightning dancing on the tip of his wand. "We'd heard you were taking something that best belonged elsewhere, didn't realize you'd stooped to taking kids."

Abra's face twists up horribly. "What I do is none of _your_ business." He jabs his wand in Cold's direction again, obviously intent on getting back to the kid, and an arc of power flows out only to be intercepted by a similar one from Weather Wizard, the power of both following his command and grounding itself on the floor. Abra lets out an inarticulate scream of rage but wrestles control back in time to disintegrate the Boomerang sent his way before it can reach his person. The two wands disconnecting send a backlash of power at Weather Wizard with the same movement and he's thrown back and off the stage.

No one turns to check on him, but a moan insures them all that he isn't dead, in case they were really worried. Mirror Master creates another hard light construct to cover the hole.

"See," says Mirror Master, the acoustics of the theatre doing a wonderful job of masking the direction of his voice, and causing Abra to eye his constructs wearily, "that's where we keep on running into a little bit of a disagreement, isn't it? You keep saying it isn't our business, and we keep having to remind you that these _cities_ are our business. And like we've told you before - **we have**_** rules**__."_

All of the Mirror Masters raise their Mirror Guns in unison, and fire a blast at Abra. Boomerang uses it as a cover to throw another weapon, Cold fires a layer of ice on the stage making Mirror Master happy once again that they've all changed over to the kind of slip free soles that will find a purchase, and the Trickster rolls something that looks like it could be marbles or gum (but has a ninety percent chance of being something completely different) across the floor.

A number of small explosions occur and for a moment Abra is obscured. None of them lower their weapons or get out of their defensive positions.

Abra laughs, the smoke clearing to reveal him in perfect shape, his personal force field still flaring slightly around him. "You won't beat me with your pathetic toys."

The Trickster laughs with him, happy and care free. "Of course not," he says. "We're just the distraction."

"_What?"_

Trickster rolls his eyes, as though Abra didn't hear him the first time. "We're the distraction. He's the one who's going to beat you." Before Abra can ask 'who?' the Trickster leans to the side and reveals a very unhappy looking Pied Piper.

The low whistle that had been vibrating at the base of Mirror Master's skull since just after the fight started suddenly grows, and Piper lets out a few short blasts of sound that crash upon one another with dissonance. Several loud cracks sound in response, and Abra's own toys crack and fall apart - including whatever it was that had been holding the kid up. Mirror Master catches him falling out of the corner of his eye, and he can hear him gasping heavily for breath after he lands.

"We've told you not to fuck around in our cities before, Abra," says Cold, stepping forward as Abra tries uselessly to get his equipment to work. "And I think we've given you enough warnings, wouldn't you say boys?"

The grim silence is answer enough.

"From now on stay out of our way, and stay out of our cities." Cold points his gun at Abra almost point blank, and flips a little swtch on the back with his thumb. "Assuming, of course, that you manage to survive."

Cold fires, and Abra releases a final scream of fury before it is suddenly cut off and he is encased in ice. Not the suspended animation that he uses on civilians, but the genuine cold ice that has no problem with taking a life.

"Get the kid and let's get back to the hideout. We're done here."

They lay down their arms, so to speak, Mirror Master calling off his constructs and Boomerang going to check in on Weather Wizard. Curious Mirror Master Walks around to get a closer look at the kid.

Red hair. Gotham.

Man, if this is Ivy's kid he's never going to another park again, cause from what he's heard about her 'we found him this way' probably isn't going to be enough to keep them safe.

oOoOo

Searching an entire city is crazy. Searching two is bordering past ridiculous. But that's what they're doing anyway. Little by little, block by block, they are whittling down the places where Wally is likely to be.

That's what Artemis has to keep telling herself, keep telling anyone who questions the speed they are going at or the places they are checking. Robin made the map and gave each of them their routes, designed specifically to search as efficiently as possible, and they've only deviated from it a few times at Batman's urging so that Catwoman can conduct her own search. Even if it feels like they are doing nothing what they're really doing is inching closer to the inevitable moment where they find Wally.

And damn it, he better be in good enough shape for her to hit him, because they've worried too much about him for him not to deserve a slap on the head at the least.

"I sense nothing at this location," says J'onn. She still isn't used to his earth look, a bald black man with a long overcoat, but she's glad that she has a few familiar people on her team none the less.

"Sheyera?" It's become almost normal at this point for Artemis to act like nothing is going on during a mission while she does things that are utterly unbelievable when she has a moment to stop and process it, and be effected by it, and calling League members like Hawkwoman by name is no different. She pushes it aside for the moment because there is something more important to focus on. "Did you find anything?"

Shayera, her wings hidden by some kind of cloaking device, shakes her head. "The nth metal didn't react to anything."

Artemis sighs, and looks across the rest of the group. Red Tornado ,Green Arrow, and Wonder Woman are on her search team as well checking out a warehouse on the other side of the street. They haven't found anything there either.

"Let's go, we can get to the next target fastest by rooftop."

On top of the roof she contacts the others. _Thirty-three D and E, no sign of Kadabra._

Robin's mental voice is tight. _Roger that._

Artemis glances to the east, just off of her search grid, taking in the lay of the rooftops in the dim dawn light. A sign a few blocks away catches her eye. _Robin, you said Kadabra is known for being a showboat, right?_

_Pretty much. Why, do you have something?_

_About a block off of our search pattern, it looks like it's an old abandoned theatre. And if he's the kind of villain that likes to keep a running theme…_

She can feel Kaldur pondering what she's saying before he even makes his response. _Indeed. Artemis, take your team, check it out. Robin, run a search for all other locations that fit with Kadabra's 'theme.'_

Artemis shoots an arrow from her small cross bow embedding it at a good point of leverage in the next building."This way." She doesn't wait to see if they follow at this point, just makes her way over as quick as she can.

_Already on it. I'm looking at five other spots that match, but – yeah, two of them get too much foot traffic to work, even if Kadabra sets up out of phase, and one of them is already inside our search grid. I'm calculating the most efficient way to add them to our routes now._

Shayera gets to the theatre next, and she wastes no time in pulling out the nth metal. As she brings it close to the door something sparks.

_Might not be necessary. It looks like we've got something._

oOoOo

Selina is loosing her patience. She's loosing it with Heatwave, she's loosing it with the Bat, and most of all she's loosing it with no one being able to find the son of a bitch who took Wally.

So when Batman says "Selina" sharply in her ear she barely manages to contain the irritated 'what' she wants to snap in reply.

It doesn't take Batman long to carry on anyway. "Abra Kadaba was just found frozen solid in his hideout. While it was apparent he had been there at some point Kid Flash was missing when they arrived."

A low growl works up in Selina's throat as she puts two and two together. Heatwave turns to her the look on his face warring back between surprise and fear. "What the hell's going on?"

She attacks, and a brief tussle on the ground leaves her victorious, her legs pinning his arms to his sides and her claws extended and digging in to the skin of his neck just enough to leave harsh indentations. "There's been a change of plans. You are going to bring me to your hideout with the other Rogues, with none of the bullshit you've been giving me so far, or I'm going to have a new scratching post."

When Batman nor Heatwave voice a protest Selina lets herself feel a small thrill of victory.

No mare waiting, no more playing around.

It's time to get the Kid back.


End file.
